Before streaming services, before Hulu, before Netflix and before high school, there was 7th grade me sitting in the back of the bus, anxious to arrive home before 4:00pm. At 3:58pm, I would quickly shoot out of the bus, race an equivalent of 6 houses down the street and burst through my front door, expecting my mom’s urgent, “Hurry! It’s started!” It was 4:03 and I had made it home just in time to hear Carol King: “Where you lead, I will follow…” For the next hour, I would watch Gilmore Girls with my mom. Homework could wait.
I have been watching Gilmore Girls for over half of my life, so long now that it is hard to tell whether my life resembles the show or the show resembles my life. Sometimes the imitation was blatant. At age 16, I named my first car, a jeep, Lorelai after the show’s main character, who also drove a jeep. I majored in journalism, just like Rory, Lorelai’s daughter, and became the editor-in-chief of one of my university’s publications, just like Rory. Even though I planned on going to the University of Texas, I bought a faded Yale t-shirt to represent Rory’s school pride. I sat on the couch for five years beside my mom at (almost) 4:00pm, watching the same show and singing along to the same lyrics, and the only thought I ever had was “I want to be exactly like Rory when I grow up.” Every “you’re like Rory, from Gilmore Girls!” comment I received was a gratifying reminder that I was following her lead.
Fast-forward to my first week of college. Streaming services now prevented any need for fast sprints to catch the beginning of the show, and Gilmore Girls was now on Netflix. I sat in my very first college dormitory laundry room, protecting my turning clothes. I was bored, and I realized that I could watch an episode of Gilmore Girls to pass the time. I start from the beginning, and I begin a binge-watch session so lengthy that I am forced to wear wrinkled clothes for the rest of the week. To my amazement, somewhere between the time where I ran home to watch Gilmore Girls and the time where I could click instantly to begin an episode, I had achieved my dream of becoming whom I thought I was supposed to be. The similarities between Rory and I were striking and satisfying. So, it was during this first college Gilmore Girl binge session that I stopped focusing on Rory and begin to see the show as a whole.
It was only in this laundry room, when my mom was not beside me, that I began to focus on Lorelai. I began to realize that Rory and Lorelai’s relationship was extremely similar to my relationship with my own mother. Things that we said and did, Rory and Lorelai also said and did. Again, I had to wonder, “Which came first?” It is possible that through all those years of couch-sitting and theme-song singing, we watched the Gilmore Girls for an education. It is possible that both individually and together, we learned through Gilmore Girls whom we wanted to become. Even still, every time I decide to binge-watch a new season, I learn something new about myself, about my relationship with my mother, about what it means to be a woman today. After every binge session, it’s like I had rifled through old family photos. I feel both nostalgic for the past and excited for the memories to come. And then, of course, I call my mother.