“When the horns hit your ear like a kick in the rear, that’s the convoy. “Freedom convoy.”
Roberta Nichol, 69, of Regina, is a musician and retired schoolteacher who has captured the frustration of Ottawa residents dealing with the truckers’ protest in a light-hearted reworking of the Dean Martin classic, That’s Amore. Photo by Screengrab YouTube /Roberta Nichol
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A retired Regina schoolteacher and singer-songwriter has captured the frustration of Ottawa residents dealing with the truckers’ protest in a light-hearted reworking of the Dean Martin 1950s classic, That’s Amore.
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In the video that Roberta Nichol recorded on her phone earlier this week, which has already racked up more than 27,000 views on YouTube, the 69-year-old woman wears a plaid flannel shirt, dark glasses and backwards baseball cap, setting the scene with a toy tractor in the foreground. She introduces the tune with a guttural “Honk, honk.”
Strumming an acoustic guitar, her clear, strong voice picks up the lilting melody: “When the horns hit your ear like a kick in the rear, that’s the convoy,” she sings sweetly, “Freedom convoy.”
Nichol was inspired to write the new lyrics to the familiar tune last weekend, when she was awakened from a nap on the couch. She lives in Andrew Scheer’s Regina riding, not far from the Saskatchewan Legislative Building, where truckers have been showing up the past two weekends to demonstrate.
Roberta Nichol said she “really feels” for the residents of Ottawa who have been dealing with the truckers’ disruption for two weeks.Photo by Marcus Fernando /.
“I decided I would have a wee lie down after lunch,” Nichol said in an interview, “But I started waking up after a while and I could hear this weird, blaring noise. I thought, ‘What the heck?’ Then I realized, ‘Oh, for Heaven’s sake, it must be the trucks.’”
She opened the door to confirm her suspicions and was confronted by the noise. “Okay, I’m mad now,” she thought to herself. “I was having a nice sleep; I was like a grumpy bear after hibernation.”
The melody popped into her head and the words began to fall into place. She scrambled for pen and paper, working through the pain of tendonitis in her hand to write down the lyrics and then perform for the camera.
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Scenes of the protest as it continues downtown on Wellington Street in front of Parliament Hill. Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia
Scenes of the protest as it continues downtown on Wellington Street in front of Parliament Hill.Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia
Scenes of the protest as it continues downtown on Wellington Street in front of Parliament Hill. Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia
Anti vaccine mandate protesters have set up camp at 1500 Bronson Ave., Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022 Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
A woman tries to navigate a downtown Ottawa street as hundreds of truck drivers remain parked in the parliamentary precinct.Photo by Spencer Platt /Getty Images
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa. Linzi Schofield of Smiths Falls displays her unique sign on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022. Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa. Professional barber Calvin Isaac Maltin of Medicine Hat, Alta., was giving free haircuts to truckers on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /jp
Police block a downtown intersection as truckers and supporters continue to protest COVID-19 vaccine mandates in Ottawa.Photo by BLAIR GABLE /REUTERS
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
Calvin Isaac Maltin of Medicine Hat, Alta., was giving free haircuts to truckers on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
Rose Ravensburgen and her husband and three children have been in their truck on Wellington street since the beginning of the protests. Photo by Elizabeth Payne /POSTMEDIA
Marc Paul and Theodora with their seven-month-old baby. They both lost jobs due to vaccine mandates, they say, and want to support the cause “for our children”. They are from Ottawa. Photo by Elizabeth Payne /POSTMEDIA
Danny Beauregard and his wife and two young children have been living in a trailer on Wellington Street in front of Parliament since the protest began. He has no safety concerns and says they are warm, well fed and have other children to play with. Photo by Elizabeth Payne /POSTMEDIA
Danielle and Marc Kozlowski came to Ottawa from Vernon, B.C., with their children Arianna, 8, Emerson, 7, and Braylin, 2, for the protest.Photo by Blair Crawford /POSTMEDIA
The “Freedom Convoy” protest continues in downtown Ottawa on Wellington Street in front of Parliament Hill.Photo by Jean Levac /POSTMEDIA
The “Freedom Convoy” protest against COVID-19 mandates continued in downtown Ottawa in front of Parliament Hill Wednesday.Photo by Jean Levac /POSTMEDIA
Scenes of the protest as it continues downtown on Wellington Street in front of Parliament Hill.Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia
Scenes of the protest as it continues downtown on Wellington Street in front of Parliament Hill.Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia
Anti-vaccine mandate protesters have set up camp at the Zibi sight in Gatineau. Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
The Zibi protest is largely being led by an activist group known as Les Farfadaas. Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
Anti-vaccine mandate protesters have set up camp at an undeveloped section of the Zibi property in Gatineau. Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
The protest continues on Wellington Street in front of Parliament Hill. Photo by Elizabeth Payne /Postmedia
Truckers occupation and protesting continues in downtown Ottawa Wednesday.Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Truckers occupation and protesting continues in downtown Ottawa Wednesday.Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Corrine Steele from Guelph walks down Wellington Street Wednesday. Corrine has visited Ottawa twice since the protest started to lend her support.Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Bobby Ramsay from Ottawa set up his sign on Wellington Street and talked to protesters all day Wednesday. Bobby talked about how the protest has affected his community and city.Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Truckers occupation and protesting continues in downtown Ottawa Wednesday. Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Truckers occupation and protesting continues in downtown Ottawa Wednesday. Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Truckers occupation and protesting continues in downtown Ottawa Wednesday. A little girl plays in a puddle on Wellington Street Wednesday.Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Truckers occupation and protesting continues in downtown Ottawa Wednesday. Truckers gathered on Kent Street Wednesday. Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Truckers occupation and protesting continues in downtown Ottawa Wednesday. Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Truckers occupation and protesting continues in downtown Ottawa Wednesday. Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Children on a school bus noticing the protesters Wednesday.Photo by Tony Caldwell /Postmedia
Demonstrators resupply propane tanks to the Wellington Street protest Wednesday morning. Ottawa police say they’re cutting off such fuel deliveries.Photo by Blair Crawford /Postmedia
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /jpg
Anti-vaccine mandate protests continuing in downtown Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Errol McGihon /Postmedia
The Freedom Convoy demonstration in front of Parliament Hill on Wellington Street in Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia
The Freedom Convoy demonstration in front of Parliament Hill on Wellington Street in Ottawa on Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2022.Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia
A Freedom Convoy rally in front of Parliament Hill on Wellington Street.Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia
A Freedom Convoy demonstration in front of Parliament Hill.Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia
A Freedom Convoy rally in front of Parliament Hill on Wellington Street.Photo by Jean Levac /Postmedia
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“That’s how driven I was to write this,” Nichol said, adding that she “really feels” for the residents of Ottawa who have been dealing with the truckers’ disruption for two weeks. “This was such a minuscule scale compared to what you folks are going through.”
While the video is collecting more views than Nichol has ever seen for one of her songs, her teacher’s mindset is wondering about the protesters’ childhoods.
“Sometimes when there’s this constant barrage of loud, I have to wonder,” she says. “Were you not heard as a child? Did your parents never listen to you? What happened to you that you feel you have to pound your chest and yell?”
As a Canadian, she finds it embarrassing. “We just don’t act like that,” she says.
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Born into a musical family, Nichol has been singing as long as she can remember and playing guitar since she was 14 years old. She was in her teens when she performed at the first Regina Folk Festival in 1969, and counts folk singers like Joan Baez and Buffy Sainte-Marie as major influences on her own songwriting.
When Nichol thinks of freedom, she is reminded of a friend, now deceased, who was forced to attend the former Marieval Indian Residential School on nearby Cowessess First Nation. That’s where the bodies of hundreds of children were found last year.
“That was truly a taking away of freedoms,” Nichol said of the residential school system. “The freedoms of the children, their parents, their grandparents. When you’ve got that happening in your country and you have a problem with a poke in the arm? It boggles the mind.”