Today, the thoughts of Canadians are with the people in the Maritime provinces as they face yet another powerful winter storm. As if this winter has not been brutal enough, weather forecasters are predicting another 30 – 45 centimetres of snowfall.

I remember the cold winters in Nova Scotia very well as I participated in three of them, from 1977 to 1979.

It was my last winter in 1979, that was the most memorable for me.

That was the winter when I got my driver’s license.

At the time my husband was a member of the Canadian Armed Forces and we lived in a tiny little house next to Base Greenwood. The closest city was Kentville which was thirty miles away.

It was on a very frosty and snowy February morning when my husband drove me in our 1973 Buick Electra to Kentville for my scheduled road test.

A powerful storm had hit the night before and only the main road through the city had been plowed.

No doubt, this was frustrating for the nice man giving me the road test.

In the end, it was all over in less than five minutes.

That was long enough for the instructor to tell me to drive a block down the road, turn around and come back. Then he quizzed me on the parking brake. His final comment to me before he handed me my driver’s licence was that I went over the train tracks a bit to fast.

That was it.

Three months later Frank decided to leave the forces and that we would be moving back home. Home, to Ontario where the traffic in incredibly more intense than the sleepy little village of Greenwood Nova Scotia.

It would be several more years before I could call myself a confident driver, but not until after I had driven through Toronto a couple of times. That was when I felt that I had truly earned my motoring wings.

There is however one more challenge that I hope to face one day, and that is to be able to drive through the streets of Rome Italy.

Roman drivers are quick to tell you that anyone who can drive through Rome seven times is given an honorary Roman citizenship.

Bring it on.