People
Canada is a country where nothing seems ever to happen. A country always dressed in its Sunday go-to-meeting clothes. A country you wouldn’t ask to dance a second waltz. Clean. Christian. Dull. Quiescent. But growing. Yes, it must be admitted, the Dominion is growing.
— Carol Shields

Behind the line May contain spoilers.
Our reading
An editorial interpretation.
Shields sketches Canada as tidy, respectable and sleepy. Nothing happens, and you wouldn't ask it for a second dance. Then comes the twist that it's growing anyway, a wry admission that dullness isn't the whole story.
Context reviewed