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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Pinochle Helps Keep Octogenarian In The Game

It might seem that playing pinochle with Catherine Offutt can be hazardous to your health.

Since Offutt, 86, started playing regularly 20 years ago, almost a dozen of her partners, including all four men in an eight-some of husbands and wives, have seen spades. But the cause of death has more to do with age than a pinch of arsenic dropped by the lady in old lace.

Pinochle, she says, keeps her busy. Staying busy, she says, keeps her going.

“When they pass away, I have to find new partners to get a foursome,” said Offutt.

When not cutting the cards, Offutt, a sweet, smiling, white-haired grandmother, tends to her verdant garden of hibiscus and gladiolas. She opens the morning paper first to the sports page to see how Ken Griffey Jr. played.

But Offutt jumps at a game of pinochle quicker than you can say hearts.

When all her various partners are healthy - the youngest is her 65-year-old niece - Offutt plays three times a week.

“It’s not like that baseball player who never missed a game,” said Offutt, who has lived in the same Hillyard house for 50 years.

The game is the cards version of 2-on-2 basketball. Partners work together to score points, passing cards in hopes of finding “melds” of queens and kings.

Like playground players tossing insults, players bid against each other for the right to call trump - sort of like getting the ball first.

Her favorite partners gather once a week for a penny-ante game of “racehorse” pinochle, where partners trade cards with each other. The big loser last week was down 25 cents.

The pinochle group started 20 years ago with Offutt’s three sisters. But time played as a fifth in the foursome, taking her three sisters.

Offutt rounded up her sister-in-law as a replacement, but she died in December 1994.

Nadine Gile, Offutt’s partner since 1991, said Offutt is notoriously lucky. In two short games last week, she took trump twice.

“I don’t cheat; I’m just lucky,” said Offutt.

Both Gile and Offutt have lived in Hillyard since 1946, when the railroad industry was booming and nearly every other lot was empty.

“There used to be many young people our age,” said Gile, 78. “Now they still are our age.”

Offutt said she will continue to take care of herself as long as possible.

For now, she has few problems. A grocery store is a few blocks away, family in Spokane look after her, and the summer rain has watered her hibiscus.

The secret to a long, healthy life? “I read this the other day: (The writer) attributed long life to the fact that (he) didn’t die. That’s the secret,” Offutt said with a laugh.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo