Why "The Brown House?"

This blog is supposed to be about home renovations, as well as the last 100 years of Montreal's history told through a biography of the house itself. There's plenty of material out there for me to comb through, sure. I could throw a rock and hit several relevant archives. I've also got all of the sales transactions for the house since it was first built in 1915, and neighbours who have lived in Ville Emard since 1970 and 1952 respectively.

However, I have yet to do any serious renovations, nor have I had time to do much interviewing, let alone do any archival research. I'm not really sure how to navigate the historical and narrative matrix that I have envisioned, and this has stopped me, so far, from even undertaking any writing. So, although part-time work and almost full-time parenting might keep me out of the archives and my tool belt on a nail I pounded into a joist downstairs, I have decided that it's not going to prevent me from writing at least a little bit.

So, Noah, my son, calls our house the brown house. Until he turned four, his principal house was one half of a bright red duplex in a fly-in community in Nunavik (Northern Quebec). The houses in the village are brightly coloured, and Noah became obsessed by the color of everyone's house. Paulie lives in the blue house, Jacob in the brown house, and Tertiluk in the green. So, when we decided to leave Kangiqsujuaq for Montreal, we explained by saying that we were moving from the red house to the brown one.

The name stuck. We still call our little duplex by its colour, and indeed, Noah's little sister Evie has begun to call it "The Brown House" too. So, when I decided to start a new writing project, it was obvious what I wanted to call it. As you can tell by the url, www.thebrownhouse.blogspot.com was already taken. Like so many other projects, cranky old Ingrid's blog about her crazy dog, pies, and pet possum never got off the ground. A trip over to www.thebrownhouse.wordpress.com revealed that the domain name I sought was at least being used. The author gives her musings and meanderings on life, Amish Love, and Shaq's mom.

Anyway, I tried out a couple of other domain names, but I eventually settled on lamaisonbrune.blogspot.com, for two reasons. First, Noah is bilingual, so he actually calls the house "la maison brune" just as much as he does "The Brown House". Second, I like being a pretentious anglophone who appropriates a French domain name even though I write in English. Sure, I'll toss in a phrase from time to time, and probably put it in italics just to be cool. Before committing, I googled "la maison brune" to make sure that "maison" didn't somehow become masculine (stupid anglo) and found out that I'd be dealing with some historical baggage. Apparently, the Braunes Haus was the Nazi headquarters in 1930s Germany. Wonderful.

Anyway, if you happened upon this blog looking for the virtual headquarters of Quebecois neo-Nazism, you'll be disappointed. And, you can go fuck yourself... or should I say vas te faire foutre.