LORELAI: “Oh, and lots of cars stopped at a blue light on Garvey Avenue. Why a blue light? Well, ‘cause blue’s the new red.”
Garvey Avenue is a major road in the San Gabriel valley of Los Angles’ Eastside district [pictured]. For the purposes of fiction, there may be some confusion or conflation with Garvey Street, which is in the city of Everett in Massachusetts, three miles north of Boston, once a part of Charlestown and still bordering it. That might possibly be seen as confirmation that Christopher and Sherry live in the Charlestown area of Boston.
Dirk Squarejaw, a reference from the television show Mystery Science Theater 3000, previously discussed. It’s a name given by the show’s commentary to one of the characters in the 1950 sci-fi film, Rocketship X-M.
I’ve always thought Lorelai and Rory must have been fans of Mystery Science Theater 3000, as their own way of watching film and television mimics it. Now it seems as if Jess is a fan too. The parallels between he and Lorelai are getting positively spooky.
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.
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.
LORELAI: It’s gonna be Harvard [that Rory’s going to].
SHERRY: Well, I certainly hope so. It’s just minutes from here. Did you know that? …I’ve already clocked it – two point seven miles, which is nothing. I’ve already checked out the best late afternoon route for her to take to come over after classes.
Lorelai has already driven to Harvard University – how can she not be aware how close it is to Sherry and Christopher, that she also just drove to? The fact that Cambridge is right next to Boston must surely be a bit of a giveaway.
I’m not sure exactly where Sherry and Christopher live, but the Bunker Hill area in Charlestown is 2.7 miles from Harvard, which is a nine minute drive [pictured]. This is the oldest part of Boston, and Christopher did say he’d like to live somewhere historical. Any further west, north or south, and they wouldn’t be living in Boston, and any further east, they would be too far away.
If so, for Rory to visit them, she would need to take a bus, and would still have a walk of at least twenty minutes. The other way would be to take the subway, which would require a change in the middle, and there would then be a ten minute walk. A fifteen minute bike ride might be easier.
The knowledge that Rory going to Harvard means her spending a lot more time with Christopher and Sherry must surely be making it seem less attractive to Lorelai.
SUSAN: Yeah, you and Christopher are like a poster for Aryan breeding.
Susan refers to Lebensborn e.V. (meaning “Fount of Life” in German), an SS-initiated, state-supported, registered association in Nazi German with the stated goal of increasing the number of children born who met the Nazi standards of “racially pure” and “healthy” Aryans, based on Nazi eugenics.
The Aryan race is an obsolete historical race concept that emerged in the late-19th century to describe people of Proto-Indo-European heritage as a racial grouping. There is no evidence to support this. By the 1930s, this false concept was used to promote white supremacist ideology, portraying so-called “Aryans” as the “master race” – ideas which formed part of the ideology which led to the Holocaust.
Appallingly, Susan implies white “Aryan” babies are naturally beautiful (even before they are born!). To add to the discomfort, she says this in front of Gail, who is black. I think this is meant to tell us just how awful Sherry’s friends are, and by extension, Sherry herself.
LORELAI: Not quite. A half hour before I had Rory, I was eating a pepper sandwich and watching TV. [to Rory] You were almost named Quincy.
Quincy ME, mystery medical drama series which aired from 1976 to 1983 (Lorelai must have been watching a repeat). Jack Klugman stars in the title role as a LA medical examiner who routinely engages in police investigations. The show was inspired by the book Where Death Delights, by Marshall Houts, a former FBI agent. Quincy’s character is loosely modelled on LA “Coroner to the Stars” Thomas Noguchi.
Lorelai said that she spent several hours in labour before having Rory. I presume that when she says she was watching TV half an hour before having Rory, she means that’s what she was doing half an hour before labour started.
MAUREEN: It’s a little game. Everyone gets a diaper pin, and if you say the word “baby,” the person catching you saying it gets to keep your pin.
At the baby shower, no one is supposed to say the word “baby”. Yet, during the game where they are shoving cotton balls into the bag, Sherry continually says the word baby and no one takes her pin or corrects her. Either the “baby pin” game only lasted a short time, or Sherry got a free pass because it’s her baby shower.
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: Yeah. Christopher would’ve been happy with either, but I really wanted a ballerina.
Apparently Sherry thinks any girl is automatically a “ballerina” – perhaps a reflection on Amy Sherman-Palladino’s upbringing by a ballet teacher. Of course, not every girl wants to be a ballerina, and plenty of boys enjoy ballet.
The Annotated Gilmore Girls 