I am standing near the windows at the back of Whole Foods in Columbia. If I lean to the left near the olive oil section, I can capture the view of Lake Kittamaqundi I once appreciated every workday. I can replicate the view, but there is no bringing back the Rouse Co.

The shoppers moving around me don’t seem to notice the little boats dotting the water just outside. They are too busy evaluating the produce and choosing specialty items to put in their baskets. I wonder how many of them realize this space was once where James W. Rouse envisioned the town they now live in.

Rouse made a point of saying “Our concern for people and the quality of their lives begins with the people who are the Rouse Company.” I fantasize about holding a meet-up here of former Rouse employees, with each of us standing in the approximate spaces where we once worked. It’s amusing to imagine such silliness.

Part of the magic of the Rouse Co. was its headquarters. In the mid-1960s, the not-yet-legendary developer “Jim” Rouse hired the not-yet-world-famous architect Frank Gehry to design his company’s new headquarters. A white stucco multitiered box, bedecked with redwood trellises and rooftop terraces, nestled beautifully on the shoreline with glass window-walls overlooking the lake. A bit of California cool custom-built for Rouse’s dream team.

The Rouse Co.’s former headquarters building reopened as a Whole Foods three years ago. The irony wasn’t lost on people who had spent their careers inside its walls, bringing to life planned communities and shopping malls. It seemed almost fitting. But still not quite right for a building with its pedigree and history. This place — where Rouse believed a cadre of people could dream big enough to build a new utopian town from scratch — was now home to a chain grocery store.

Times change, people forget, the world moves on.

This year, Columbia celebrates its 50th anniversary, with events focused on the future while honoring its roots. That history includes the 2004 sale of the Rouse Co. to General Growth Properties. It was a landmark deal that signaled the end of an era for the 65-year-old company. A company with a long reputation as a great place to work, riding the wave of Robert Levering’s annual publication of “The 100 Best Companies to Work for in America.”

Coincidentally, the quality of employment in the United States has taken a destructive slide in the years since the Rouse Co. disappeared from the big board on Wall Street. In today’s era of careless Scrooges, the Rouse experience seems like a myth. Rouse offered retirement benefits, a company vacation cottage program and — when that was still unusual — benefits for domestic partners.

Jim Rouse once said, “Optimism makes things possible, and as long as the possibility for change exists, the more likely it is that substantial change can occur.”

Caring about people and the places they lived and worked earned Rouse the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1995. He set many examples for living a meaningful life. Among them, the benefits of a generous employer and an appreciative workforce.