IT seems that every popular song ever written about snow sings the praises of the white stuff which, if the lyricists are to be believed, transforms the mundane landscape of everyday life into that fantasy winter wonderland.

The trouble is that – as so much of Britain has been discovering – real-world snow tends to be a lot colder, wetter, dangerous, inconvenient and prone to turn into grey slush than the stuff in the song books. When enough of it falls, roads become blocked, vehicles crash or fail to start, airports are closed, isolated communities are cut off, lines of supply fail and domestic animals go short of fodder.

A snowy scene can, of course, be a thing of great beauty and until the past couple of days we have been able to admire them – as well as less appealing scenes of road, rail and airline chaos – from afar, thanks to television news broadcasts. Now, however, we appreciate the truth. In common with the rest of the country we are ill-equipped to deal with more than the merest smattering of flakes wet, dry, powdery or soggy in the extreme.

This should really come as no surprise – though it seems to have a considerable shock effect every time a freak winter weather pattern lodges over our shores. Snow in Britain – and more especially in the Channel Islands – is a relatively rare phenomenon and we are simply not geared up to cope in the way that the Scandinavians or the Canadians are. They know that snow will come as sure as winter follows autumn and they know how to deal with it.

In truth, our Transport and Technical Services personnel do more than can be expected of them when drifts accumulate and our roads are transformed into skating rinks. Salting and gritting occurs at times of the morning when most of us are still two or three hours away from the alarm clock’s call to duty. In addition, it is totally unreasonable to imagine that the department could maintain a fleet capable of clearing every thoroughfare ready for the morning rush hour, for the very good reason that it would spend 99 per cent of its time in mothballs.

Complain about the inconvenience thrust on us by Mother Nature by all means, but let us remember that, in these temperate climes, we are lucky that heavy snow is a rarity, that impassable roads will soon be passable again, and that what is anathema to the world of work can be sheer paradise for the young – especially when the schools are closed.