Is it a sucker or a lollypop?

Well, it finally happened. I have become my grandmother. We were at Cedar Point on Saturday with our two grandchildren, and I was waiting in line with my grandson, Charlie. Sometime during the day something was eaten then drooled down the chin (Charlie, not me). There was a spot of something I couldn't rub off. Chocolate, I suppose ... he was with Grammie and Papa. As we waited in line, I tried to clean Charlie's face. But the harder I rubbed, the more irritated Charlie was getting. So I remembered an old trick from my grandmother. When we had something on our face she couldn't wipe off, she would get out her hanky, put a little spit on it and wipe our face with it. Worked like a charm. So I tried it with Charlie. Worked like a charm. Who needs wet wipes? Spending time with children is a learning experience. After Finley's soccer match earlier in the day, she got a snack from one of the parents. One of the treats was a sucker. "It's not a sucker," she said. "It's lollypop." An organic lollypop, on top of it. Later on she, put on her bathrobe with a hat on it. "No, Papa," she told me. "That's a hood." She is a lot wiser than I am. Words mean different things to different people. Earlier this spring I was umpiring a high school softball game in Monroeville between the Eagles and Sandusky at Clark Park. Anybody who has been at the park knows the Huron River flows just north of the park, parallel with the first base line of the softball field. Any foul ball hit too far out of play has the chance of taking a ride in the river to Milan. Sandusky was batting and a foul ball went toward the river. Sandusky's first-base coach hollered "that one is heading to the creek." "It's a river," Monroeville coach Abe Helmstetter said with a laugh. To the Sandusky coach it was a creek. To Helmstetter, it was a river. When you drive over the Edison bridge toward Port Clinton, are you over the lake or the bay? How about this one from "This Day In Baseball" On May 27, 1986 — "Hey, when you build a building on the ocean, what do you expect? You expect fog. They should blame themselves for building it on the ocean." — Oil Can Boyd, after a game at Cleveland Stadium, located on the shore of Lake Erie, is postponed due to fog. The Red Sox are credited with a 2-0 victory when the game cannot be continued due to the dense fog that rolls into Cleveland Stadium. The postponed contest, which ends with the Tribe having base runners on first and second with two outs in the bottom of the sixth inning, prompts Boston's right-hander Oil Can Boyd to infamously blame the lack of visibility on the ballpark's proximity to the ocean, not nearby Lake Erie. Lake or an ocean? River or a creek? sucker or a lollypop? Hat or a hood? I'm so confused. Jody gets mad when I ask her to pick me out a pair of trousers to wear to work. And here's another question: Is it a creek or is it a crick? When we were in Bay Village on Saturday to watch soccer, we were stopped at a traffic light. There, when somebody pushes the walk light, traffic both ways is stopped for the pedestrians. Just like the old times in uptown Norwalk when traffic would stop both ways at the corner of Main Street and Benedict/Whittlesey for pedestrians while a bell would ring. Why the bell? It was so blind people knew when to cross. That's when you could cross the street diagonally. Try that now and you better say a prayer. Here's another question. Is it downtown Norwalk or uptown Norwalk? Just ask Stan Obrenovich. He will tell you. Joe Centers is Reflector community editor. He can be reached at jcenters@norwalkreflector.com.