In August of 1966, Jim Grimsley entered the sixth grade in the same public school he had attended for the five previous years in his small eastern North Carolina hometown. But he knew that the first day of this school year was going to be different: for the first time he'd be in a classroom with black children ... Now, over forty years later, Grimsley ... revisits that school and those times, remembering his personal reaction to his first real exposure to black children and to their culture, and his growing awareness of his own mostly unrecognized racist attitudes. -- Provided by publisher.

Freedom of choice/black bitch -- An awkward fight -- Tiger beat, Teen, Ebony, and Jet -- Black and proud -- The sign on the wheelchair -- The kiss -- The hierarchy of place -- The learning -- The fight in the yard -- White nigger -- Divinely white -- Good old boy -- Johnny Shiloh -- The shoe man -- The uncomfortable dark -- The maid in the weeds -- Integration -- The J.W. Willie School/bag lunch -- The drowning -- Robert -- No longer separate, not really equal -- Cheap -- The mighty Trojans -- Some of us dancing -- The human relations committee -- Protests -- God gave me a song -- The smoking patio -- Horizons -- Mercy -- Commencement -- Reunion.