Summary

Coates opens the note by reflecting on his attendance (along with his wife) at the Aspen Ideas Festival in the Colorado Rockies, a gathering of intellectuals, in 2008. He presents himself as a fish out of water at the conference, a person who did not understand many of the ideas he encountered there but who was afraid to say that he did not know. He recognized then and recognizes now that by not professing his ignorance, he was missing out on a chance to learn and engage in the sense of wonder he had had as a very young child. A terrifying but exhilarating trip he took with Kenyatta on a ski lift reinforced this feeling.

Coates then shifts gears to discuss his wonder in the summer of 2008 when Barack Obama closed in on the Democratic...