A mother awaits the arrival of her daughter Dee. She cleans and prepares the house with her other daughter Maggie. The mother imagines Dee and her meeting on a reality show where they embrace emotionally, and Dee expresses gratitude for all her mother has done to support her successes. The mother observes how Maggie has walked with her head down, shuffling her feet since their house fire over ten years ago. Maggie is ashamed of the burn scars on her arms and legs, and she is darker-skinned than Dee. The mother and the community church raised money to send Dee to college in Augusta. Since then Dee has pitilessly filled her and Maggie with knowledge they "didn't necessarily need to know," and shoved them away when they acquired any basic understanding of the concepts she discusses. Dee is branching off into her own world, and has been since she was was sixteen. The mother feels satisfied that Maggie will marry since she is not that bright.   Dee soon arrives at the house with a man. She wears a "loud" dress in orange and yellow hues and long dangly earrings. Both she and the man have large afros, and the man has a long beard. Dee excitingly introduces the man, Asalamalakim, to the bewildered women. He attempts to hug Maggie, but she falls back in fear. Dee tells them not to move and snaps polaroid photos of the family in their shocked state. She also takes photos of a cow in the yard and then the house. The mother greets Dee, who immediately denounces her name and says she now goes by "Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo." Wangero argues that she could not bear being named after people who oppress her. The mother retorts that she is named after her aunt. Wangero asks who the aunt is named after, and the mother responds it was her mother and knows she can trace it even further if needed. The mother assures Wangero that she will call her the name she wants.   At dinner, Asalamalakim declares he doesn’t eat collards and that pork is unclean, but Wangero eats everything delightfully. She is joyous at the fact that the family still uses the benches her father made for the dining table. Then, she asks if she can have the butter churn top and dasher that her uncle whittled out of a tree to use for house ornaments. As Dee wraps them up, the mother reminisces about the labor put into making the butter. After dinner, Wangero goes to the mother's bedroom and brings out two stored quilts that were pieced by Grandma Dee and then quilted by the mother and Aunt Dee. They contain fabrics of clothing from family members, as well as a small blue clothing piece of their great grandfather's Civil War uniform. Wangero asks if she can have the two quilts. The mother suggests for her to take one of the others, but Wangero declines because they were stitched by machines. The mother explains that she meant to give those quilts to Maggie when she married. Wangero gasps and retorts that Maggie will mindlessly put them to everyday use and turn them into rags. The mother replies that she hopes she will because they have been unused for too long and Maggie knows how to make more. The mother remembers Wangero's refusal of the mother's offer to make her a quilt for college because she thought they were out of style.   Maggie comes out and defeatedly says Wangero can have the quilts and that she can remember their grandmother without them. The mother abruptly snatches the quilts from Wangero and gives them to Maggie. Wangero walks away to the car with Asalamalakim, telling her mother that she just doesn’t understand her own heritage. She kisses Maggie and tells her that she and her mother need to make use of the "new day" because they are disregarding it. After Wangero leaves, Maggie and the mother enjoy some dipping tobacco and then go to bed.