Rory’s job situation during “Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life” is a little *too real* for any freelancer out there

It’s been years since we last saw our beloved Rory Gilmore. Last we checked, she had just graduated from Yale and was about to hit the road to cover Obama’s presidential campaign (That is, Obama’s first presidential run). Rory always spoke of becoming the next Christiane Amanpour, a foreign correspondent who isn’t afraid to get into the trenches, so to speak. And considering that Rory Gilmore always did exactly what Rory Gilmore always set out to do (like write for the school paper, win debates, become valedictorian, get into the ivy leagues, etc.), most of us probably imagined her first scenes to be her reporting from the front line in Syria or Palestine or someplace similar. When Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life picks up, what is Rory Gilmore, our favorite journalist, doing these days?

There had been some previous speculation that Rory would become a teacher, but anyone that’s watched the new episodes knows that’s just a possibility she might take on later and not what she’s actually doing. Fast forward a decade or so and we find Rory’s circumstances are much different from what we originally pictured.

In Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life, our opening shot finds us face to face with Rory and Lorelai at the gazebo in Stars Hollow. And what we find out about Rory is both slightly disappointing but also painfully familiar.

As any writer struggling to make it these days knows (and there sure are a lot of us), the competition to get noticed is fierce. And despite her talents and background, even Rory is having trouble coming up in her current profession as a freelance writer.

In “Winter,” we discover that Rory has recently published a piece for the New Yorker, an interview with a woman named Naomi Shropshire (brilliantly played by Alex Kingston). Everyone’s talking about the piece, including Luke, who has now posted a copy of it behind every single menu at his diner. Rory’s piece has garnered her the attention of some shots publishing houses, though they keep postponing their meeting with her. The CEO of a website called SandeeSays is also courting her throughout the first couple of episodes, though she’s reluctant to meet with them.

As A Year In The Life moves forward, we continuously realize that while Rory has been a somewhat successful and accomplished freelancer in the past (she’s published with other big names like Slate), she is now somewhat floundering. This isn’t uncommon in the freelancing world, so in a way it’s pretty refreshing to see even she has trouble now and again.

Toward the later half of the show, she ends up taking a (non-paying) job as the editor of the Stars Hollow Gazette, in an attempt to keep them running. And after she’s booted off working on a book about the somewhat dysfunctional Ms. Shropshire, she ends up deciding to write her own book (with a little nudge from Jess, of course).

We’re not sure what’s in store for Rory in the future, though it’s safe to say that she will likely land on her feet. Will she find a publisher for her mother-daughter book, Gilmore Girls? Will she finally write that piece about lines for GQ? Probably yes, and then some.