English is a peculiar language. The familiar turns of speech can recoil strangely off a young growing ear and mind.

For years I’ve repeatedly used the saying, “six of one: half dozen of another” to express that any choice in the matter-at-hand didn’t matter to me. Should we buy vanilla or chocolate mint ice cream? – “six of one: half dozen of another.” Would I prefer my drinking water at room temperature or iced? – “six of one: half dozen of another.” It didn’t matter to me whether I sat in the middle of the couch or to the right of the middle – “six of one: half dozen of another.”

But my familiar refrain was a strange riddle to my teenaged daughter. In a recent conversation together, she told me how she had misunderstood what I had been saying – for a long time. “I always thought it was a math problem,” she told me. “And no matter how I worked it out, 6-0-1 does NOT equal half a dozen!”