Jan

I think there are two defining things about me. 1. I was conceived in Hollywood, at the Highland Hotel where my parents lived when they first got out there. That gives me an inherent je ne sais quoi. Delusions of granduer if you will. She said she married him because he looked like James Dean. It didn't work out. So, she told him she was taking me back east so her grandparents could see me. She packed so it looked like she would be gone for a week, took me, sent him divorce papers when she got there. I was 6 months old. Pretty Ballsy in 1951. I grew up in Brockton Ma. that's where Rocky Marciano comes from...and where I get my scrappy side. My mother had tremendous fashion sense, I assume that's where I get my love of clothes and dressing up, certainly my shoe fetish! We lived in a big, really old, rambling house that used to be a toll house for the stagecoaches that went between Boston and Taunton. It was the 3rd oldest house in Brockton. It had beautiful gardens my great grandmother planted. There were apple trees and a pear tree, a grape arbor, and the biggest cherry tree you've ever seen. Lilacs and iris' bird baths, flagpoles and rose covered arbors, like my own garden of Eden, and I was so happy there...My great grandparents lived upstairs. I lived downstairs with my Mimere, my mother and My Uncle Sonny after he came home from being in the Navy over in Korea. He was 17 years older than me and took no end of delight in physically torturing me! I got my love of cars from him, he always had the most up to the minute chevy...Secondly, I'm the mother of twin boys, that I pretty much raised by myself. That gave me a lot of stamina, strength of charachter (due in large part to the number of trips I made to the emergency room with them over the years). They gave me a reason to get up every morning, no matter how tough things got. I love them more than life itself. I mostly work as a Nanny for the children of musicians and artists. I'm pretty old fashioned when it comes to kids...I actually expect them to mind what I say. Sometimes I work on a paint crew with Asa Brebner painting houses and apartments...Asa(http://www.asabrebner.net/index.html) is one of my favorite people in the world, and a great musician, who's played with tons of people. He was in Jonathan Richman's Modern Lovers, I think that's so cool.. working with Asa, it's a little like hanging in a dressing room, only your up a ladder! I've worked in a lot of cool shops, like GOODS in Harvard Sq. in the 70's and most recently Pluto in J.P., also, as a production designer on stupidly independant films and as a prop mistress in theater. I was on the Somerville Arts Council for two terms and on the Board of Directors for Somerville Community Access T.V. where I co-ran a film festival for a couple of years, at Tufts U. When people ask me what I do I tell them I'm a muse. There is a fair amount of truth in that statement. I like inspiring people, or helping them get a leg up, whether it's a songwriter, aspiring film maker, a painter or photographer, I like to lend a hand... I've been a photography and artist's model for about 30 years. I'm French by nationality, it makes me feel very Montparnasse!! Some of the photos/paintings have been shown in Museums and fancy galleries, which is kind of cool. I've always been a music girl. I wouldn't say my adolescence, after my mother remarried, was any kind of picnic..IT was a hard adjustment to make. They had 4 more kids starting when I was 10... 3 sisters and a brother...I'm glad I have them now, but I wasn't all that crazy about having to take care of them all the time. Music is really what kept me sane, I used to stand in front of my mother's old motorola, the kitchen radio on top of the refidgerator, playing all the British Invasion music.. and going to see the Orphans play at St. Colemans and St. Edwards. I graduated the year of Woodstock, promptly left home, and spent my time in the early 70's hitch hiking around the country and hanging out with musicians and rock stars. .Whether I was in a broke down van or riding to the show in a limo, I was always with a band. Not as a groupie. It was always about the music for me, not getting laid. I could sew on buttons, talk guitars and amps and I always gave an honest opinion. I lived on Cape Cod when I first left home. We'd had a summer house in Hyannis, on Lewis Bay, so I knew my way around and I just love Cape Cod from the core of my being, it was a great place to be a flower child! A lot of good stuff happened, and some pretty crappy stuff. Hitch hiking, although I did it when everything was still supposed to be all peace love and bullshit, wasn't the brightest thing. I met alot of fantastic people, but I got myself in some big messes too. Sometimes I think I'm lucky to still be here. I've tended to live in places where there was a strong music and art scene. I lived in Provincetown from 1974-76. I loved being by the water, the history, and creativity. P Town was still pretty bohemian then. Nobody cared if you walked down the street with bells on your toes or a bone through your nose. You can do that pretty much anywhere today and no one would look at you sideways, but back then, things were still totally buttoned up and provincial. It was somewhere I felt like I could be myself without getting a lot of shit for it. I lived two doors down from Robert Motherwell. Norman Mailer was a few doors down from him. Lot's of artists and interesting people were in town then, Nan Goldin and David Armstrong, Cookie Mueller, Edith Massey, Bud Cort, Viva Superstar Jackie Curtis and Holly Woodlawn.... You could find yourself sitting next to a Warhol Superstar or a John Waters character any day of the week. After PTown, I moved to Boston and became part of the punk scene. I modeled for Amy Arbus, Diane Arbus' daughter and became something of a local, what? I don't know, but the pictures were put in a paper called STUFF and I started seeing them tacked up on peoples walls wherever I went. It was pretty weird, because really, I was just a salesgirl. I modeled for a lot of the punk/new wave clothes designers, and was in a lot of the fashion shows in the clubs. There was a really close bunch of people involved in ART, MUSIC and FASHION. I saw a lot of great music. Besides all the fabulous local bands, it seemed like there would be a band from England come to town every week. It really was like some kind of explosion...I met my Husband while he was playing in The Peter Dayton (of LaPest) Band during the Rumble at the Rat. He was from New York, a briliant bass player, but totally whacked. He brought me to NY where He also played with Larry Kirwan, and Hammy of Black 47. We had a really good time in those days. I worked at Trash and Vaudeville on St. Mark's Place. Working at Trash gave you a certain amount of cache....The Clash were playing 17 nights at Bond's. The Clash and every other band that came to town came through Trash's doors. I got asked out by everyone from Bruce Springsteen to Rat Scabies working there....but I was a newlywed so I turned them down! One of the coolest things was I got to know John Belushi pretty well...the girl who played his daughter in Neighbors was loosly patterened after me! I modeled for East Village designers, performed in avant guarde theater stuff, mostly at Club 57, I even stood naked at the Mudd Club, well, pretty naked I had a big ribbon and heels on. It was only a year in N.Y.C., but I definitely got my moneys worth. When I found out I was expecting "a baby"... We lived in one of those East Village apartments where the bath tub was in the kitchen and the refridgerator was in the living room and the toilet was in a closet. We didn't know where we'd put "the baby".....So we moved back to Boston. We named "the baby" Michael and Joshua, twins. I usually do things with flair, why should child bearing be any different? They were the most beautiful babies. I used to dress them in 50's clothes, they looked like little rockabilly kids, The Collins Kids. We lived a rock lifestyle. My X got strung out on heroin though, and that was the end of that. I mean that was the end of him and me, I still do live a rock lifestyle! The kids, who are 25 now, and I, have a very strong bond, they are wicked good looking, smart and gainfully employed! I've had a great "boyfriend" for the last 16 years. We never got married, but we're generally thought of as an enduring couple. We enjoy each other. We go to Jackman Maine every summer and stay in a wilderness, turn of the century, hand hewn log cabin, on a lake, with no running water or electricity. We are happiest when we are in a canoe floating down the Moose River. Simon's, now here's a big surprise, a musician. He played with Johnny Thunders in the 80's. After so many years in rock bands, he, along with the heavenly Kelly Knapp (lead singer of the all girl Boston band The Bristols) WITHOUT A DOUBT MY FAVORITE GIRL SINGER IN THE WORLD........., they've had a great Y'alternative band called the Darlings. He sometimes plays out on his own, Simon Ritt. He's lucky to have the two premier Boston guitar players work with him, local legend, Billy Loosigian and the new kid on the block, Tony Savarino. Simon's a great song writer and I'm his muse. It really sucks getting old, but I think you can do it with dignity.... Maybe you can't stay young forever, but you can stay cool....I'm trying. That's my story, and this is My Space. North Pearl Street. My mother and I on the "North Lawn", Brockton Heights 1951 Auntie Lorraine sent me a MuMu! You should see me do my Hula Hula My Donald Duck costume that Mimere made for my first dance recital Ready for my big night....there were rhinestones on the bow. Little Jan Ellyn in the news.... Teenage Jan in the news.... 25 years old, in the garden of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum 28 years old Future Dad? Who did they think was doing all the work here? Boston Rock 1982 Martin Olive's Polyester Party in the Rose Garden behind The Boston Museum of Fine Arts....Introducing...the Collins Twins I spent a lot of time on the floor when they were babies! My cowboy and Indian! 16 years and counting........................................ Home | Browse | Search | Invite | Film | Mail | Blog | Favorites | Forum | Groups | Events | Videos | Music | Comedy | Classifieds