FROM SHORE TO SHORE: Bridge club throws a baby shower for fellow player

Walt Gable has played bridge for years and been a member of the Seneca Duplicate Bridge Club since its inception in 1980.

When it comes to bridge he’s seen it all ... except a baby shower.

But that’s just what happened last month, when the group threw a small shower for fellow players Kristin and Dave Slade of Geneva, who are expecting a baby daughter July 20.“It’s just not something of the typical population that plays duplicate bridge,” said Gable, noting the players of the game are usually much older and their numbers are dwindling.

When the club started 33 years ago, it was common to have 15 or so tables of two pairs each playing bridge, he said. Nowadays when the group gathers on Thursday evenings at the Office for the Aging in the Seneca County Office Building in Waterloo, there are only three or four tables of card players.

Kristin Slade, an assistant professor of chemistry at Hobart and William Smith Colleges, is a relative newcomer to the game. She was egged on by her husband Dave, a chemistry lab instructor at the colleges who has played since he was 4 years old when his grandmother taught him the game, she said.

“I didn’t start playing until three years ago and even then it was casually,” Slade said. “He taught me and we would play once, then again a few months later he would have to reteach me.”

A good friend at the colleges and fellow bridge aficionado, John Ford, suggested the Seneca Duplicate Bridge Club to the couple. Slade says she’s really enjoyed it because it’s not “competitive and cutthroat” and she’s enjoyed the supportive, teaching atmosphere.

“I really, really do like it. I’m just late coming to the game,” said Slade, adding her husband and Ford have been “evangelists” of sorts trying to build up the playing ranks of bridge players.

“They are constantly trying to teach anyone who even expresses a remote interest in the game,” she said.

To celebrate the impending birth, the bridge club members pitched in and purchased a baby changing table for the Slades and presented it to them at the shower. Member Julie Miles of Newark also made a beautiful pink wreath adorned with baby accessories like booties and a bottle and Gable “went all out” decorating, Slade said.  

Whether the Slades will be able to continue playing with the bridge club after their daughter is born remains to be seen.

“We are hoping to, but we don’t know how realistic it is. Someone suggested whoever has to sit out can hold the baby while the rest of us play, but I don’t know how well that will go over with the men of the club,” she laughed.

Porter is editor of Life by the Lakes. Email her at scporter@fltimes.com.