While Paris is still at Chilton, she sees Jamie, the Princeton student she had a date with in Washington DC. Jamie had her phone number but never called, thinking he didn’t need the “distraction” of having a girlfriend. Unable to think of anything but Paris, he has still not phoned her, but turned up at Chilton to see her.
Characters love showing up impulsively as a romantic gesture on the show – as is the way, Jamie waits patiently until Paris comes outside, and she hasn’t been kept back by a teacher or school meeting, and nobody from the school tries to move him on or report him to the police for hanging around the school gates.
Although Paris is shocked and flustered that Jamie has appeared three months after their date in August (confirming that it is now November), she is quickly persuaded to listen to him, and they go to have coffee together.
LORELAI: Apparently, Miss Patty showed his wife a picture of me, and she thinks I look like Elizabeth Taylor, which makes her Debbie Reynolds, and Stanley Eddie Fisher.
Singer and actor Edwin “Eddie” Fisher (1928-2010) was Elizabeth Taylor’s fourth husband. His first wife was actress and singer Debbie Reynolds (born Mary Reynolds, 1932-2016), a close friend of Elizabeth Taylor. Married in 1955, Fisher and Reynolds divorced in 1959 when it was revealed that he had been having an affair with Taylor. It caused a huge scandal at the time. Eddie Fisher and Elizabeth Taylor were divorced in 1964, and she and Debbie Reynolds reconciled and resumed their friendship some time in the late 1960s or early 1970s.
Seeing how upset Lorelai is over Sherry’s pregnancy, Rory suggests that they egg Jess’ car in order to make themselves feel better. This suggests that although Rory acted as if she was okay with Jess, the person who totalled her car, getting a car, she is in fact quite resentful over it. Finding Shane’s bra in the vehicle was no doubt quite a twist of the knife.
This is a callback to the conversation Rory had with Christopher in “I Can’t Get Started” where she said, “We take disappointment extremely hard. I mean it. Property damage is often involved”.
JESS: I’ve been working there twelve hours a week for the past few months to get extra money for the car.
Walmart, previously discussed. There is a large Walmart Supercenter in Hartford, which might be where Jess has been working [pictured]. How he’s been getting there without a car for months is a mystery – if he was taking the bus back and forth, you’d think his path would have crossed with Rory’s at some point, or someone would have noticed him at the bus stop. Perhaps he’s been getting a lift with someone.
Luke really isn’t taking enough notice of Jess as a guardian. Jess has been working out of town for months, either getting lifts or catching the bus, and done a course in order to get certification to drive a forklift. Jess’ dedication and work ethic is commendable – Luke’s lack of interest in his life isn’t. What if Jess had been doing something dangerous or illegal all these months?
When Luke asks Jess what his Walmart discount is, he responds with 15%. In real life it is 10%.
It’s been shown several times over that Jess is Lorelai in teenage boy form, and here is another parallel between them – like Lorelai, Jess is beginning his working life while still in his teens, and isn’t afraid to work hard in a blue collar job to pay the bills, just as she did.
LORELAI: Thank you for finally being on my side for something.
RORY: Mom, I’m always on your side.
A really harsh comment from Lorelai, who is obviously at a very low point, emotionally. Rory has almost Stockholm Syndrome levels of support for her mother – Lorelai has done some really terrible things to Rory (like kissing her teacher at work in front of other students, or letting her freak out over the fact they had termites), and received nothing but kindness and forgiveness in return.
SHERRY: Yeah, I’ve been wanting to tell you, actually. Chris and I had a rocky stretch. I thought for sure he was out the door. I mean, he was so distant and hardly ever talked. I wasn’t even sure if I was gonna tell him about the baby. I thought I was gonna either go it alone, or not go through with it at all. I mean, I was kind of in the same position that you were in when you were pregnant, do you know what I mean? … I decided that I would tell him before I made any decisions, and that was the weekend he was with you and Rory, remember? There was a wedding or something . . . Well, I don’t know what happened or what you said, but whatever it was, it worked. He came back a changed man. All of a sudden, he was so attentive and devoted, and so willing to make it work. He said that he’d missed out before, and he didn’t want to miss it again. And I just credit a good portion of that to you.
Christopher said that he and Sherry had problems in their relationship, but from Sherry’s perspective, it was that Christopher was withdrawing from her and “quiet quitting” their relationship.
It doesn’t really make sense that Sherry credits Lorelai for changing Christopher’s attitude. Sherry decided to tell him about the baby, and Christopher returned to Boston, saying he was there for her and the baby, and didn’t want to miss out on fatherhood for a second time. Why would she think that Lorelai made the difference, rather than the knowledge he was going to be a father?
My hunch is that Sherry intuitively knew or suspected that Christopher and Lorelai shared something on their weekend together (if your boyfriend you’ve been having problems with spends a weekend with his ex, there’s a good chance you’re going to get suspicious about it).
I think she tells Lorelai that it’s because of her that Christopher returned to her as a way of warning Lorelai away from Christopher, or to let her know that she knows she and Christopher slept together, and that they don’t need to discuss it any further.
MAUREEN: Okay, I’m drunk, which is why I’m telling you that we were very shocked when you told us because you are so not a baby person.
SHERRY: Oh, I’m still not. I mean, she’s all mine when she’s got the legs to dance, but Christopher’s the baby person.
Previously, Sherry told Rory she wanted at least two children, and was considering becoming a single mother using a sperm donor, she wanted to be a mother so badly. Now she says she’s not a baby person, and later tells Lorelai she considered an abortion.
It’s possible she means that although she wants to be a mother, she doesn’t particularly care for babies, and considering having an abortion in a shaky relationship is normal. However, it does sound like Sherry simply misrepresented herself to Rory (and Christopher?).
Lorelai and Rory must be stunned to hear that Christopher is a “baby person”. Really? Either Christopher really does feel as if he missed out on Rory’s babyhood, or that’s the story he’s telling Sherry. Maybe both Sherry and Christopher have been dishonest with each other.
The fact that Sherry doesn’t see herself as a baby person is a foreshadowing of what occurs after she becomes a mother.
SHERRY: You have to give me your list of books, okay? … The ones that you read when you had Rory.
LORELAI: Oh, I see. Um, I think I was reading Deenie at the time . . .
Deenie, a 1973 young adult novel by Judy Blume, previously discussed. It is about a teenage girl named Willmadene “Deenie” Fenner who has to wear a back brace due to scoliosis. Although initially upset about the brace, Deenie eventually becomes resigned to her fate, and decides to give up the dream of being a model that her mother pushed on her. There is possibly a little parallel here with Rory eventually giving up the dream Lorelai pushed on her.
SHERRY: Well, it’s a work-in-progress. It was so bachelor pad before: rock posters, modular furniture, magazines everywhere.
When Sherry leads Lorelai and Rory into the apartment she shares with Christopher, we can see it is the same one they lived in at Christmas 2001, even though Christopher told Emily and Richard he and Sherry were looking to buy a new place of their own. The buying a new place story was another of Christopher’s untruths, because Sherry says nothing about them hoping to buy another home, and talks of this one as a work-in-progress, as if she hopes they will continue improving the one they already have.
The odd thing is that Sherry talks about the apartment as if it was one Christopher lived in alone before he got with Sherry, calling it his “bachelor pad”. That doesn’t fit in with the story we heard from Christopher, which is that he lived in Berkeley until he met Sherry, after which he relocated to Boston to be with her – and would have presumably moved in with her, or they would have moved into a place together.
From what Sherry says, Christopher was already living in Boston by himself, and Sherry moved into his apartment (where did she live before that he didn’t move in with her, when she apparently makes more money than he does? With her parents?). Did Christopher meet Sherry in California, and then move across the country and get an apartment in hopes of being with her? Which is weird and stalkerish, and seems like way more effort than Christopher would put in? Or did he move to Boston independently, and meet Sherry there?
It seems as if Christopher cannot tell people one simple thing which is verified by someone else. It’s as if everything about him is a lie. Christopher as a character barely exists.
SHERRY: Oh, go shopping some other time and come play with us. Please? There’s just a bunch of people in there that Rory doesn’t know, and having you here would make her so much more comfortable … I meant to extend the invitation to both of you. I just wasn’t sure if you’d . . . Well, you know, there’s lots of food, and booze for the lucky non-pregnant ones, and cake . . . it’ll be fun … I’ll block your car with my stomach.
When Lorelai goes to drop Rory off at Sherry’s baby shower, Sherry is waiting out the front for them, and immediately pressures Lorelai into attending as well, despite how uncomfortable the idea is for her. There’s some guilt tripping on how Rory would like her to be there, some bribery in the form of food and alcohol, and finally just threatening to block her car so Lorelai would have to run Sherry over in order to leave. The baby shower is more or less torture for Lorelai, and this is the beginning of it.
It’s a bit weird that before, Sherry didn’t want to have any relationship with Lorelai, and now she’s insisting that Lorelai come to her baby shower. I guess pregnancy has changed her. Lorelai, of course, doesn’t care for the idea of Sherry either shutting her out or inviting her in!
Sherry has dyed her hair blonde since we last saw her, suggesting she has now turned “bad” in Gilmore Girls logic. It’s a flattering look for her, making her more threatening to Lorelai.
The Annotated Gilmore Girls 