Some people are looking over their shoulders and marvelling at how far we have come; others are peering into the distance and observing how far we have to go; and there is a small groups stubbornly digging their toes in demanding to know why we have to move at all.
On my visit to Nova Scotia, the Speaker of the House in that province acquainted me with some of the history there. There were about 60 treaties signed which promised rights and freedoms mainly around an agreement for colonising peoples to live in harmony with the indigenous tribes - we are allowed to call them Indians again - who had been inhabiting the land since time immemorial.
In true colonising fashion, none of the provisions were ever implemented and land was carved up by surveyors and settled. Natural resources were exhausted or threatened and those welcoming indigenous peoples wondered what the hell just happened, while any insubordination by First Nations people balking at the imposition of government were punished.
However, after many fits and starts, remediation is slowly being effected.
In any society you have those ahead of the game and others struggling to catch up. The early adopters seem extreme zealots, but later on are celebrated as visionary or just exhibitors of common sense - which I have never found to be all that common.
We can take some pride in knowing we are moving along faster than all other countries with a similar history. The respect New Zealand has internationally for having the courage to face our past and make steps to compensate and rectify for injustices is huge.
Although those looking forward and rueing the distance left to travel would remind us that the pause for back-patting should not hold us up too long, even tangata whenua are generally pleased with the speed of settlements.
But that is only one inequity that needs rectification. There is still housing, health, welfare, justice, employment and education statistics which point to more needing to be done.
Thankfully most of this work is well under way, and those who are not so happy would still prefer New Zealand's initiatives to the inertia of some countries and the minimal progress of others.
Canada has a strong affinity with New Zealand. Many have visited our shores and those who haven't are very keen to do so as soon as possible.
Canadians love the landscape and the culture of both Maori and pakeha. They wish they enjoyed a history that, in spite of its flaws, looked more like ours and was less horrific than the one they have to live with and account for.
You have to have broad shoulders and a thick skin to say what you think as a politician. But being a politician shouldn't and doesn't define me. I am a lot of things before that - husband, father, citizen, neighbour etc - and in all these things very proud of the country I call home. Even if that history would say we are not as pure as the driven snow, the worst that can be levelled at us is best of a bad bunch in terms of our pioneering history. We are doing more than any other country to put right the wrongs of the past and I am emphatically and unrelentingly proud of that. We all should be.
