Relationship goals I learned from ‘Gilmore Girls’
Everything’s coming up Gilmore. Maybe it’s because we passed the show’s 15th anniversary, or perhaps it’s in light of an upcoming Gilmore Girls Netflix revival, but it feels like we’ve all made a return trip to Stars Hollow for good. And it’s easy to understand why…Stars Hollow was a town filled with love. Love between mother and daughter, love between mother, daughter, and coffee, and love between mother and diner owner, to scratch the surface. Hell, Stars Hollow was a town filled with #relationshipgoals.
Now granted, not everything went smoothly for Lorelai and Rory in the romance department. We can’t all have aspirational relationships like Paris and Doyle, that’s just reality. Regardless, the two blue-eyed babes were able to collect proposals like Pokemon cards, so like, I’d argue that either way there’s plenty to learn about love from them. So with that in mind, here is everything Gilmore Girls taught me about bad boys, marriage, and a town that votes on your break-up.
Sometimes your true love is right across the counter.
From the moment you see Lorelai and Luke interact you know, without question, that these two are going to boink someday. Their chemistry is undeniable no matter how much Luke tries to cover it up with his gruffness, so I cannot even imagine how viewers were able to hold out about four years before they became a tangible thing. So it just makes you think: perhaps the person you’re meant to be with is the one you see every day. That’s why I keep making sex eyes at the guy who works at Vinnie’s Pizzeria. Or all the guys who work at Vinnie’s Pizzeria. Or pizza.
Town meetings must be called every time you get a new boyfriend.
I don’t know why Stars Hollow is so emotionally invested in Rory and Lorelai’s lives, but it’s a thing. And despite being hardcore Luke-and-Lorelai shippers from the get-go, everyone freaks out when the two actually call together. “The co-mingling of the owners of these two establishments can only set the stage for disaster,” says perpetual buzzkill Doose, before he pulls charts, literal charts. Is this normal? I feel like nah.
Everyone needs a Jess phase.
Listen, we’re all pro-Rory-and-Jess here (and if you’re not, you need to leave) but he’s not… I mean, nobody’s going to contest that he is super shady, right? The side of me that’s still in 11th grade finds his bad boy nonchalance dreamy and the fact that he reads? Stellar. But then he’ll drop out of school to work full time at Walmart and you’re like, “Jess, plz.” That kind of behavior does NOT fly in a stable adult relationship.
Lorelei sums it up best: “I think Rory’s 17 and it’s probably about time for a Jess.” It’s basically cliche. Granted, later seasons would insinuate that if Jess continued to mature, he would transcend from Rory’s soulmate to like, an actual viable, respectable boyfriend. Let’s make it happen, Netflix.
You probably shouldn’t sleep with your married ex-boyfriend, but if you do, do it to “Satellite of Love.”
Rory has a lot of great qualities, but impulse control is not one of them. Cut to Rory losing her virginity to Dean (srsly, Dean) which is decidedly not cool, although, if you’re gonna make an impromptu terrible decision like that, it’s cool to at least do it to Lou Reed. Don’t make the same mistake I did and lose your v-card to some 9 minute track off Electric Wizard’s Funeralopolis.
On that note, marriage is the quickest way to ruin your entire life, children are a close second.
Sometimes you may be totally fine with how things work out for you and the best of that situation. I mean, Gilmore Girls is literally best case scenario of getting teen pregnant, amirite? If not just for Lorelai, for the viewers? But in any other situation, pregnancy was a big dream-ruiner and marriage was a terrible, terrible idea. Just to run through the gamut…
There’s Lorelai’s impromptu wedding to Christopher, Luke’s impromptu wedding to what’s-her-face, Dean’s teen marriage to Lindsay. Then there’s Sookie and Jackson’s life-zapping children, and how about how April Nardini randomly breaking up theride-or-die couple of the show? All this, and don’t even get me started on how Lane threw away her rock star dreams to get married to Zack and raise twins. So unfair. #justiceforlane
And finally, no matter how weird your romantic life gets, know you can always talk to your mom about it.
Or like, maybe not, I don’t know if your mom is an Emily or a Lorelai Gilmore. Leaps and bounds. Regardless, moms tend to have eerily good insight on all things relationship-y. So next time you’re in a bind over your new crush sit down with your mother at your favorite diner, order coffee in a bowl, and talk it over.
Cue the la la la’s. Zoom out. Fade to black.
(Image via WB)
