Renowned painter Ernie Barnes died Monday at age 70.

Many of you might recognize the painting THE SUGAR SHACK (below) that graced the cover of Marvin Gaye's album "I Want You"and was used in the opening credits of Good Times.

Later Camp Lo's "Uptown Saturday Night" album cover was obviously a tribute to The Sugar Shack.

Barnes came to painting after a career in professional football, as an offensive lineman with the San Diego Chargers and Denver Broncos. Teammates called him "Big Rembrandt."

Many people would call Barnes a "black painter." He preferred the description "neo-Mannerist."

Barnes never painted his subjects with their eyes open.

"We don't see each other," he said once in an interview. "We are blind to each other's humanity."

There are some things about growing up as a 2nd generation American in the 1940's-'50's that might not resonate with folks who are 1st or 2nd generation now... lots of differences yet very subtle similarities despite the uniqueness of each time and generation. 

America's post-WWII influence over populations in the Pacific, South East Asia, Europe and parts of Africa has been enormous and will continue to be propelled by the recent global youth culture. People emigrating here within the last 40 years were often far more familiar with superficial aspects of what to anticipate when coming to America - simply from the media - than any prior migrations.

Mom's dad was a somewhat well off Lithuanian farmer's son who immigrated here at the turn of the century with his brothers to start a livery service. He sent for and married a woman who had worked on their family farm. It was not a well-approved union considering their economic and religious differences. Jewish, she converted and became a devout Catholic who kept a semi kosher household. She read her Catholic prayer book in Lithuanian but was not educated and, since her sphere of existence was focused entirely within the Lithuanian community, she had no immediate reason to learn conversational English. At 37, she was the destitute widowed mother of five children.

For whatever reasons, she did not inherit her late husband's share of the livery business - probably her educational shortcomings contributed to this in any number of ways. Consequently, she was left to harsh means to keep her house and feed her family. In 1916, her two oldest sons joined the Navy at 14 and 12 respectively, the 11 year old was sent off to work on a farm; Granny took in borders and worked a factory job. My mom, the youngest, was the only one to attend and graduate high school (with a double major) but she too was duty-bound to contribute to the household income well after she married. Granny terrorized the family with an iron hand, throwing fits and faints to get her economic way. "She had a hard life,” my Aunt Swanny would say.

In contrast, my father's folks quietly immigrated here when it was obvious Nicholas IV would not have a chance to remain in power with the impending Revolution. Their exit was discrete and immediate, via Lithuania, where they also owned property. They left all their estates and possessions, freed their serfs and started here from scratch. Paupers. Their former serfs owned more than they upon their arrival in the US. Nonetheless, they were educated, well respected, socially prominent and active in their new community. (When the Revolution did come, Nicholas sent word for my grandfather to resume his military command. Grandfather dutifully accepted, declaring to return as soon as Nicholas sent a boat to fetch him.)

My father's folks nearly died in the 1918 influenza pandemic. Consequently, their seriously impaired health mitigated their ability to maintain full-time employment. The family was kept economically together by the combined labor of their pre-teen children ... the oldest (Uncle Edward, the "Don") being 13. Somehow, all five attended high school, became avid readers and creative craftspeople. Despite their dramatically changed economic and social situation, this family was able to affect a graceful evolution of their traditional familial values into the social norms of the new dominant culture. Class, dignity and intrinsic worth had everything to do spirit and nothing with wealth. Regrettably, these grandparents passed long before I was born but their children, my aunts and uncles, did their best to pass on to me all they had learned - with no gender-based divisions.

Consequently, I was raised the Lithuanian/Russian child aristocrat in this small ethnic micro-community within a very old New England Yankee town, (incorporated in 1776), finding myself quite the outsider due to language, the residual biased dynamics of historical social class, ethnic group, the inter-class marriage between my parents, and my own congenital physical hindrances. Despite the fact that both families were considered "working class" economically, my mother marrying the son of a former high ranking Cossack was an unfathomable reality never forgiven by her mom who had witnessed the progrums in Lithuania. She was so against the reality of a child conceived from this union, she "suffered/induced" a mild heart attack within minutes after word of my birth reached her. It didn't matter I was the first - and only - grandchild. My difficult birth and mild congenital difficulties were certain affirmations of this negative union. I have no remembrance of her ever kissing or holding me...except for a posed photo. From day one, I could do no right.

By first grade, I realized I was crossing over between two distinct languages in a private school that understood only one. I determined to speak just English to perfect it. The family assisted except my grandmother. She spoke Lithuanian and I replied in English ... a battle of wills ... but it was tolerated because I complied with her petty demands.

She once chastised me for having a "Black Irish" girlfriend in junior high school, and spat on the ground declaring I kept the company of "dirty Irish muck". Probably the only English words I ever heard her speak. The gap widened. It was her response when I asked permission to go to this friend's house, having finished up my assigned gardening chores for the week.

(Around 7 or 8, I also had to contribute to Granny's weal by gardening for hours every week, doing tasks difficult for an adult-sized person. To work my way out of this predicament, by 9, I read seed catalog instructions and reconfigured the placement of the seedlings in my charge. I planted strawberries with wider aisles, pinned the runners down where they were humanly convenient, not wherever they erratically fell; I pinched the suckers off tomatoes but also sacrificed branches that impaired aisle maneuverability. Even the raspberry patch was eventually tamed for adult negotiability. All went unacknowledged even after Granny was long passed and I went to college... despite the fact that Hannibal's elephant could have easily tended the patch with no loss of yield.)

Now I do regret avoiding Lithuanian so adamantly. For decades, I could skim through conversations, act appropriately but only responded in English. By 40, any semblance of understanding was hopeless and frustrating. I knew more Danish, German and French than I did Lithuanian ... and all languages were damn hard to come by... I seemed to have developed a "tin ear" for other languages. There was no "mother tongue" to pass on to my son, many of whose classmates, ironically, were proudly bilingual. Not an issue many 6 year olds assess while in the throws of personal acculturation during the 1950's and 1960's. The gardening stuck, however. But I only cultivate evergreens and perennials, nothing edible or annual... hail Granny!

In hindsight, my best friends from ages 4-10 were all "outsiders” like myself, each in a unique way. Marguerita, a recent Lithuanian DP (deported person) was a few years older but equally focused on learning English - as were her parents who were trying to re-establish their high-level professions here.

Donna's family moved to Stoughton from Roxbury when her father was appointed the new Town Fire Department Chief. They were always quiet and guarded...prim. I realize now, their behavior was probably a response to being one of the first African American families to move from the inner city into this rural/suburban white area. Donna and I were homework buddies, played word games and she, like the other 3 friends, didn’t mind that I wore high top corrective shoes or had difficulties doing simple pedestrian things- like jumping rope or running.

Magella, the youngest of 5 children recently here from Ireland, had a father who laughed his way through a rapidly debilitating disease that left him bedridden, partially paralyzed and shortly killed him. They set his bed up in the living room so he could participate in the activities of his developing brood. From Magella's older sister we learned about pop culture, black radio stations (not knowing they were black - just that they had the good music), American Bandstand, dancing around the house. The value of older siblings was strong and positive ... it certainly made me realize the differences of being the only child in a family of 10 adults.

Of course, I got to do things they didn't. My parents always took me to nightclubs, often with Auntie Swanny (mom's sister, a gorgeous, single, fine fox and master of the perfect swan dive) who would alternate between minding me at the table while my parents danced with checking out eligible men on the dance floor. I remember seeing Cab Calloway, Count Basie and listening to jazz - and opera - at home.

It was uncle Edward, my godfather - who presided over my education, taught me to ride a bike, ice skate, hang doors and build staircases. I took riding and ballet (to mitigate the problems with my legs and feet rather than spoil me), had private art lessons, trips to museums, shopping excursions where I chose my own clothes under his discriminating eye. He was quite dapper himself, sporting Harris tweeds, superfine cotton or wool shirts, straw or wool fedoras and always cashmere socks. Cuban cigars and horse races were his forte. I loved equine events and Uncle Ed gladly ferried me to every one within a 20-mile radius. It was a ritual after Sunday Mass where I got to enter the sacristy BEFORE SERVICES and be greeted by Father Gunn's humorous quip -"Ah, the princess is here! Now we can begin the Mass." He was the pastor, owned a string of racehorses and was my uncle's best friend and running partner.

Uncle Edward was the mentor of my young life, filling in during my father's accelerating difficulties with post traumatic stress syndrome - "shell shock" as they called it - the scars of having survived too many heavy battles in the South Pacific. He was a Master Carpenter who graduated Wentworth Institute and eventually established his own small company employing many Caribbean, Southern African-American and Eastern European craftsmen, most of whom were recent arrivals to the area. Hardly your average elite Boston finishing crew of the '50's.

In retrospect, I grew up in a tiny cat-birds' seat peering at many kinds of social discrimination and racism in my own community but I didn't understand much of what I had actually witnessed and/or experienced until I became a young adult and reassessed past situations from within - and beyond - the values of my father's "enlightened liberal" family. Fighting to get African Americans into the union was one thing but having your niece involved with one was quite another. The former had to do with capitalism and economic democracy - they were excellently skilled craftsmen who had every political right to be here, to make a fair wage, and be employed and paid at a level appropriate for their talents.

Family was different. Despite everything they had taught me, nobody ever pointed out the differences between economic, social and family politics. Out of left field and nothing short of hypocritical. Doing what was ethically right had nothing to do with doing what was immediately "socially appropriate". But, "getting the brown eyes out of the family" had everything to do with it.

I first heard this phrase from a pale, blue-eyed housemate of Irish descent lamenting her parents discontent with her dating a Dutch-Indonesian man. "It took us a long time to get the brown eyes out of the family" was her mom's hot retort. Peculiar a phrase as it was, immediately I flashed back to my own family, from whom I had then been estranged for over a decade. That phrase succinctly put events into perspective.

Family stories: Aunty Mary, Dad's older sister, was often regarded as the black family maid rather than a family member, despite her blue eyes. My grandfather married my grandmother "because she looked so Nordic" - an ultra blonde with high cheekbones and rivetingly light blue eyes - the distinguishing feature inherited by each offspring. Ironically, Aunt Mary was the only one whose hair was black and straight - not ultra curly and light brown or blonde.

Shortly before my dad passed (when I was 20), he mentioned that there was a city in Nigeria called Owerri, named after the river that ran by it. Ibo land. Generations ago, a male ancestor was brought to Russia, allowed to keep his name and integrate freely into society. Perhaps it was around the time Pushkin's African ancestors arrived, or those of Dumas, Dvorzak, Beethoven...17th or 18th century? In addition to the main house in Moskow, the family also had a new apartment in St. Petersburg and an old house just east of Odessa...(which I found out later, from Chester Higgins, was probably in or near Tumi, the oldest African community in Europe, dating back to the 14th or 15th century ... populated by people of Ibo descent. I wonder if they all look like me.)

While doing art historical research in Nigeria in 1971, I was stunned by some people's responses to me once they knew my last name ... ancient chiefs prostrating themselves before me, being seated at the table in an honored place, being zipped through customs. Alas, Owerka is the name of one of the ancestral ruling families in Owerri and in itself, means "Owerri is great". All I met in Nigeria assumed I was the new English wife of Chief Owerka.

You never know where you're going to run into prides or prejudices or from what they might actually spring, especially the more subtle, personal ones. When I was 50, I reconnected with a junior high school crush, Richard, who had lived in an apartment next door when we were, say, 10-14. At that age, we knew we clearly had eyes for each other, but I never could figure out why he always distanced himself from me.

As 50 year olds, he casually told me his father had seriously admonished him from even thinking of becoming interested in me because I was the granddaughter of a very prominent Cossack, a Count, close to the Czar. Richard's family was Jewish but had Anglicized their name way back when. It didn't matter to his father that my Cossack grandfather had already been dead for a quarter of a century or had left Russia more than 50 years ago. Deep stuff, stranger than fiction. Ironically, now, he lived across the street from the house Alyasha and I inherited from Granny via Aunt Swanny. Small world, but a small town.

Prejudices are all very personal - assessed or not - by each individual. You are what you think/believe ... and don't think about/accept ... as well as what you eat. It is all food. Each person has the ability to end discrimination, starting with taking stock in themselves and their own perspectives as well as their inherited family values. Fine line between culture, social values and personal belief. All are endemic of a specific time and place but are ladened by the plight of past times. What about crimes of honor... it is estimated that 5000 women are killed each year by relatives for defying their family.

Assess yourself and all that truly entails you and your personal life on this planet now. There's always more than meets the eye.