Out in the Cold

In the nine years I have lived in France, I have never really gone out of my way to meet other Brits. In fact, at the moment, the only British friend I have in Toulouse is my boss. And I guess that doesn't really count, you know, since he's a 60 year-old man and... well, my boss.

So yesterday at the indoor shopping centre, when I found myself trailing a group of three English women plus three prams... and feeling rather wistful, this was a big first.
Why did I suddenly want to be friends with these three random people? Why did I - an almost perfectly integrated semi-French girl - feel kind of left out as I saw them laughing and chatting together?

I suppose, of course, that the answer is loneliness.
Loneliness is not something we readily admit to, and it pains me a little to verbalise it now, but I think that most mums on maternity leave wander onto this territory at some point.
The thing is: wonderful as it is to gurgle and smile and blow raspberries at your beautiful 3 month-old baby all day... there comes a point when you guiltily crave a bit of adult conversation.
I think I may have reached this point.
The funny things is, I didn't realise it until I saw those three women hanging out together yesterday with their babies.

And the worst thing is: I didn't have the courage to ask if I could join them. No, I settled for being a weirdo stalker, trailing behind them for a few minutes, in the irrational hope that they might sense my presence, deduce that I was English, and call me over to join them.
They didn't, of course.
I came home annoyed with myself. What stopped me approaching them? An old fear of maybe not fitting in?
I feel like I'm thirteen all over again... watching other friendship groups form from afar, and wondering which one I could belong to, if any.

But in the meantime, things aren't so bad. I have my LB, and he's pretty good fun. And two of my closest friends just had babies last week, within two days of each other.
So there's a good chance I'll find a new group to hang out with soon enough.