Gilmore Girls Revisited | 10
Show Notes:
This isn’t our first Gilmore Girls episode, but when a show runs for as long as it did, there’s so many angles you can take. And today we are talking about High School emotions and parenting. Host Julia Washington and Guest Kendra McGaha discuss Gilmore Girls from the angle of teen parenting. Kendra is the host of I Trip Over Flat Surfaces.
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The Host: Julia Washington
The Guest: Kendra McGaha
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Transcript:
Julia: Hey friends, this is pop culture makes me jealous where we discussed pop culture through the lens of race or gender, and sometimes both. And I'm your host, Julia Washington. And on today's show. Kendra is here and we were talking about another element of Gilmore girls.
Julia: Hey, friends, love our show, but hate the commercials. Become a pop culture club member on Patrion for $10 a month to receive ad free episodes with bonus content bonus episodes of virtual meetup to discuss movies and television, and so much more to learn more about how to become one of our Patrion pals visit pop culture makes me jealous.com or visit the link in our show notes.
Julia: This isn't our first Gilmore girls episode, but when a show runs for as long as it did, there's so many angles you can take. And today we are talking about high school emotions and parenting, but before we dive in, let me introduce you to my guest. Kendra is the. Beyond that I trip over flat surfaces podcast.
Julia: The podcast that encourages women to nurture positive thoughts, enriching their life and self bias belief. Kendra's motto is to be an aggressive encourager and using her voice to encourage and promote women to take charge of the thoughts in their mind, realizing a better life. Kendra lives with her husband on a small farm with seven rescue animals.
Julia: She is passionate about animal rescue, specifically donkey and horse rescue. You can get more information about Kendra and the podcast@wwwdotitripoverflatsurfaces.com and we will link it in the show notes to make it easy for everyone to find you Kendra, welcome to the show.
Kendra: Hi, thank you so much for, for letting me be on your show.
Kendra: It's um, I enjoy the conversations that you have, and I have to say, especially, I think I've said this to you before, especially the ones that you have with your son. Oh. And that
Julia: relationship that you have. Thank you. Yeah, he's my favorite. Um, I love that you, um, have a focus on rescue animals. I think that's so important.
Julia: I live in a community that has a lot of agriculture and a lot of, um, livestock. I was just telling a story the other day about how this cow got out of the farm. And he was just, she was just having the best time walking down the road didn't care. She was blocking traffic. She was just like, I'm free. And then trotted home.
Julia: Like it was nothing. Yeah, living
Kendra: her best life. We all deserve to be free now. And then
Julia: the fan favorite Gilmore girls featured a mother daughter relationship between Lorelei Gilmore and her daughter worried. Laura Lee comes from wealth and is the only daughter of Richard and Emily Gilmore. The entire show we see Lorealai navigate her relationship with her parents at best it's amicable at its worst.
Julia: It's contentious. At worst, it's a contentious, shouting match as a, we all know because it's the premise of the show. Laura Lee gets pregnant in high school and moves away shortly after the baby is born. She believes her parents to be controlling and unbearable. She scoffs at their way of life and it never really acknowledges her own benefiting of the privilege she descends from in may of 2021 screen ramp ran a listicle titled five times.
Julia: Lorelei Gilmore was the best mom and five times it was Emily where writer Emily Procter writes this specific times. Lorelei came in clutch for Rory and they are supporting Roy's future Roy's first breakup being by Rory side with Sherry Rory's first night at Yale and Laura licensing boundaries. After Rory's decision to drop out of.
Julia: So I want to talk about localized parenting style. And when you first watched the show, what did you think of localized parenting? And when you first watched the show compared to like how you view it now? Cause it's been 20 years since the show is released.
Kendra: Yeah. Yeah. You know, honestly, I don't even remember what year it came out, but I know that I caught.
Kendra: In reruns. I think it was still on, in later seasons, but I was catching earlier seasons, um, in reruns. So, you know, when I first came across the show, I, I, again, I can't remember how old I was, but I was, I was just taken by the relationship that Lorelei and Rory had. And, um, obviously I was much younger than so who wouldn't want a mom like Lorelei and who wouldn't want to have this protected community smart kid.
Kendra: I mean, we all want to be smart. We all want to be secure and protected and have things always go our way, which seemed for the most part, they always did Ferrari. That's a whole other conversation for later, uh, seasons, but. We who wouldn't want that. Like, I had a very different relationship with my mother.
Kendra: She was older. Um, she had me when she was a lot older and they didn't do that then. Um, it was just, uh, people thought my parents were my grandparents. Oh yeah. So, I mean, wow. I really, I even look at, uh, I listened to the podcast that you had with your, your son on white Christmas. I'm just like, wow. Like I couldn't have a conversation like that with my mother.
Kendra: And so it was just, you know, you long for that. One, and I'm not saying I had a bad relationship with my mom or my mom was bad. It's just, you know, I mean, it was difficult. Yeah. It was just different. I mean, they're just that, that friendship that you long to have. And, and I think when I see my friends have that with their mothers, it's just so foreign to me.
Julia: Yeah. I understand what you're saying. When I, when we were kids, it was very much, here's the line where the parents you're, the kids, we're the parents, you know, and it wasn't until we became adults where my parents were kind of like, okay, now we can spend time together, like non parental I'm the boss kind of time together.
Julia: And it was like, Like what happened?
Kendra: Like literally like a switch. Yeah. Like really I'm same
Julia: person. Yeah. Yeah. I had a conversation the other day with another friend where it was, you know, I don't recall my parents even drinking alcohol in front of us. Like that was a thing that was reserved for their adult time.
Julia: And then when we became of age, then it was like, okay, now, now here's this part of us that you can learn about. And it was just seeing Lorelei and Rory and how involves and how much worry knew about Laura's Laura's life and vice versa, obviously. You're it was just kind of like, how did you deal with that while she was 16?
Julia: So she didn't really know any different, but yeah.
Kendra: Any friends at 16? I mean, that kid became her. I've watched that with family members of my own, where they, um, were, were left as a single parent and. Because they spend all their time with their kids. That's the only person that they hung out with. That was their only friend basically right.
Kendra: Or wrong. It's it
Julia: is what it is. Yeah. And that's, yeah, that's a good point. That's exactly what happened to Lorelei. Cause she left her family. Um, and she left everybody. She knew behind, which is so scary. Like I couldn't even imagine doing that with a child. Like I could imagine doing that when I didn't have a child and just being like, okay, maybe I can go.
Julia: It's just me. So if I fail no big deal, but kind of a deal, but to have a small dependent human and leave everything that you've ever known and your support system, whether you agree with it or not, but just, that's terrifying to me. I mean,
Kendra: I don't have children. And so I don't really get how terrifying it would be.
Kendra: I can imagine. But also if you look at it from the flip side, wasn't really terrifying for her when staying was the more terrifying thing. So for me, I viewed it as that was the, again, I'm not trying to demean having a, you know, a 16 year old as a single parent on her own. That's incredibly, um, Mount Everest type thing to overcome, but I think she saw it as the easier option.
Kendra: Wow.
Julia: Yeah. Yeah. I guess I never thought about that.
Kendra: Yeah. I don't, um, you know, my parents again, cause they were so much older and the people they hung out with were so much older. There was no one around my age. I can't, I don't know. I th I think decisions that would seem, um, Difficult later in years, um, just would seem so simple to make in the moment because it's just the preferred choice.
Kendra: Yeah. I'm like her leaving, so
Julia: yeah. Yeah.
And
Kendra: that same, sorry, go ahead. No, no, no, no. I would say in the end of course, you know, once she left, you know, pride and the whole, you know, you can't go back and know she had to
Julia: make a work. Yeah. She didn't have anything to fall back on. Really. And you see that in the first season when she kind of begrudgingly goes and says, Hey, I need help to pay for jewelry's tuition.
Julia: Like that's her only option. She doesn't have any really other options. And that's when she really does truly go back home in a sense. And, but it's 16 years later and it's not even for her it's for her kid. Yeah,
Kendra: how I felt about that when I first watched the show is different now because, um, I could, again, more relate to her, like, you know, having to go about back and ask, you know, what that must have meant, and I wouldn't have want to do it either.
Kendra: And I don't believe you should give something to someone with strings attached. However, I totally get Emily's, you know, not taking advantage of, but just, um, expanding this relationship that they now that's how I see it. Now I, back then I saw like, oh, you know, she's controlling. Exactly, exactly. But now like, okay, we now have a relationship with money.
Kendra: Let's let's just expand upon this foundation and make it something more meaningful than just about money.
Julia: Yeah, absolutely. And in that same article, Emily's five best moments are. Lorelei when Emily writes that check for Laura life for children, because you know what else like her daughter needs her.
Julia: Like, she's never not going to show up for her daughter. Right? And then the other ones were when Emily attends Laurel eyes graduation, which that episode made me cry when they're standing there and we can talk, we'll get into it. But Emily taking the blame for the incident of what happened with Christopher and telling him he had nothing to do with it.
Julia: And for our friends at home, that's the episode where Emily and Richard are renewing their vowels and she invites Christopher to the wedding and then it blows up and sh Laura and Luke break up and it's just really sad. And then the last one is Emily defending the girls after the Hunt's burgers, basically say that Rory's trash, which is like the whole series.
Julia: These people are not, they're very overpriced. They're very privileged humans. And Emily not expecting. And then in return, Emily didn't really expect to be repaid for children. Like those are the ones that the writer lists. So through Laura lies lens, Emily requested Friday night dinner as a stipulation.
Julia: But to your point, Kendra, you know, she's, you're right. She's expanding that relationship with her. And she doesn't. The other part of the, that list is in the initial episode with the graduation, Loralee, doesn't invite her parents to the graduation. It's her daughter who says like, you should do that because they've never seen her dog.
Julia: They've never seen her graduate. They've never seen that. They didn't get that when she was in high school. And she gives absolutely zero credit to Emily. When Emily comes to stars hollow to tell Luke and Laura life that she loves him and, you know, fair, localizing angry. But what did you think about Emily's parenting style when you first watched the show and how has that changed over time?
Kendra: Yeah. I grew up in a very controlling household. So to me she was very controlling. I mean, Of course, a piece of me, like, I would love to have grown up with money who wouldn't. I mean, there's pluses and minuses. I mean, it's, again, that whole different conversation, but, um, to be able to, um, have things that you, you know, really, maybe not even have things that you wanted, because I think even though my parents didn't have a lot, they always made sure I may not have had Jordache jeans, but I had gains and two pairs of jeans and that's what I wore yellow all year.
Kendra: And then, you know, um, you know, the same to, that's embarrassing for a kid, but that's what yet I had a pair of jeans, so I. You know, now that I'm older, there's so much freedom and having money, um, there's freedom to help others, which is what Emily did. And I think the money represents everything that they owed each other throughout all the years.
Kendra: Right? Like Lorelei looks at this like, like I'm not saying that, you know, this was the writers of the scenes point, but I viewed it as this is okay. You kind of own me this money. I, because of how you treated me, I left the house. I left with Roy. I did all of this. You need to take apart. And Emily's like, I, you know, I'm giving you this money for all the things that I couldn't do when you were growing up.
Kendra: And so here's yours and my shot and it, of course doesn't make up for anything, but that's how I kind of saw the money and what it represents.
Julia: Sometimes like with Richard and Emily, they didn't really know how to speak in any other language either. Like they were loving towards each other, but it was still, there was still sort of like a superficial element to it as well.
Julia: But they didn't, I mean, they just never understood Lorelei. They just didn't. They came from a generation where it was like, you are the parents, you are the child and this is how it works. And then in return, Laurel, I never really bothered to understand her parents either, but when you're 16, that's hard because you're not really in the mind space to be like, mm.
Julia: With, what's the word I'm looking for. You're not really in the space of like, thinking about others in that way and what they're going through and how they're feeling, what their emotions are. You're still kind of looking inwardly on yourself a lot. And throughout the entire series, whenever Lorelei and Rory needed something, Richard and Emily never hesitated one.
Julia: And there's a lot. Yes. And there's a lot of, you know, families money or not. Were you, if you're a fan, if your loved one, your can needed something and family wasn't there for you. Like that's hard. So. Watching it for me. Cause I rewatch it every year during the fall. Cause it's very comforting. Um, seeing how Emily just always went to bat for her kids, you know, her daughter.
Julia: And even though Laurel, I was sometimes just super awful to them. She still went to bat for them. And here's this episode that I love where I'm Jon Hamm. She meets John ham at the silent, at the auction and he ends up Peyton is his name. And he ends up being just the worst, most boring date of life. And Laurel, I was like, yeah, I'm just not going to go out on that second date because this was awful.
Julia: Like he's not, he's bored. He's beautiful, but he's boring. This wasn't anything. And then Richard and Emily sort of panicked because now their social structure is being affected by. Date situation. Cause Peyton had a great time and Laurel, I just like my dating life has nothing to do with you, but in the world of Richard and Emily at 100% does.
Julia: And like, they just could not understand each other and come together in that way. But at the end of the day, Lorelei does sort of, you know, resolve herself to do it. And everyone's there's peace again. But I feel like that's a really good example of them not really understanding each other, but then kind of sort of caving and being not caving caving is the wrong word, but then still sort of being like, okay, I'll do this
Kendra: right.
Kendra: And I mean, I don't come from money, but I can, can you imagine being a candidate. No only just the take out the money side, but just the name alone. So I can never, I would, you know, watching shows on TV and, and Gilmore girls is not the only one were rich families, you had to be a certain way. And it would be sort of like, uh, you know, being born into a family with politics.
Kendra: Um, Obama's kids, Clinton's kids. I mean,
Julia: like from England.
Kendra: Yeah. Yes, absolutely. So, you know, there was, I loved your comment about, um, you know, Emily and Richard communicated, how they were communicated with, and it's almost like, you know, almost how you see abuse passed down, you know, it's how you are treated, how you treat other people.
Kendra: And it's very hard to break that. And of course they would never break it because they never went outside of their circle like Laurel. I did. So that's, you know, you just take care of family. I mean, it's, you know, the whole. Well mafia talking about, you know, reference, you know, it's all in the family and that's just what you do.
Kendra: And I think for the most part, um, it, you know, family in general is like that if you have money or not, but especially, you know, keeping things, uh, within that type of structure and controlling it, um, even more so if you come from a prominent family
Julia: yeah. Like there's that episode when Logan brings Rory home for the first time.
Julia: And the family's just so disappointed because she doesn't understand the expectations, but yet they're in my mind, they're in the same way. Echelon of like privilege. Cause they all have money and they all have expectation and they all have some sort of power within our system and within our society.
Julia: But yet the Gilmore money isn't good enough. And Rory's comment of like, but my ancestors came over on the Mayflower, like how are we not good enough? And it just really highlights that even within, you know, these privileged classes, there's still some sort of hierarchy. Right. But also you're just like,
Julia: Whenever those ridiculous things happen, it was just like world. Did you guys live in? I'm so curious. Yeah, but there's pressure. There's a lot of pressure. There's a lot of, um, expectation and Laurel, I definitely broke that cycle for Rory, but then Rory kind of ran back to it, I guess, by, um, dating Logan.
Julia: Who's just so cute.
Kendra: Oh yes. He's very cute. Hey, I am team Logan, Jess, but I really do do like, um, Logan, but I think the layers are so interesting. So, you know, they, uh, Richard and Emily didn't want to accept Laura lie cause she was so different yet. Rory is a product of Lorelei and they accept her whole heartedly and just, you know, again, different conversation, but you know, why is that when they're so not willing to accept Lorelei and then looking at Logan's family?
Kendra: Um, the fact that. Emily and Richard are open and are okay with Rory the way that she is, even though that rural eye product and the house, she's not accepted at the hunts burgers. And I just think it's just such a product of life in general and, um, speaks to, you know, we deem, um, things to have quality based on what we value and that they valued, I guess, sort of that Stepford mom, you know, cookie cutter, you know, stay at home, have your babies be beautiful.
Kendra: Do the parties, everything that basically Emily was. Yeah.
Julia: Yeah, because later on in the season when worry, his dropped out and Richard's so upset that his bright, beautiful granddaughter, the best at everything has the biggest brightest futures dropped out. And she's a part of the Dar now, and she's doing all, you know, floating around and she's spending time with Logan, basically, essentially being a trophy wife and.
Julia: He's so disappointed. And Emily, Emily, Emily comes into his study and she's like, you need to get out here to this party. Like you're disappointing your granddaughter. And he's like this wasn't supposed to be the way it turned out and complain, not complaining, but just sort of lamenting that her life isn't turning the, you know, going in the way that they had hoped it had invested.
Julia: And then Emily clicks and she's like, you mean, you don't want her to have my life. You don't want her to be me. And that I thought was a really powerful scene because he's acknowledging that his granddaughter, like, they want her in the world, but he doesn't want her to be like all the other women in the world he's
Kendra: evolved.
Kendra: Yeah. Yeah. There's evolvement there. And I think that that's a pretty powerful, um, powerful scene. Wow. I actually forgotten about the scene until you just said. Yeah. That's a lot to unpack in that one. So, so interesting. And so where does the, what happens in life that he was able to evolve and Hunsberger is have yet to evolve?
Kendra: Is it as it take a Lorelei?
Julia: Maybe because he's so proud of her, I'm going to get emotional. There's that scene where he's just, I forget what episode it was, where he's just so proud of what Laurel has created. And he finally comes to terms with like, You did a kid. Yeah. Yeah. That's all you want. Is your parents to validate you and be like, oh, you like, yes, this is good.
Julia: You did good. You were good. You made it. And he gives that to
Kendra: her. He does it because he, she basically not followed in his footsteps. In that she went into insurance, she had her own business. She made something from nothing. She builds a community, all of those things, which he did in his industry, she did, but just not in the same way, but did the exact same thing as, uh, you know, starting at 16 and a woman doing all of that.
Kendra: And I, um, I, I do love when they're standing in the, um, I guess it's the last show, right? Um, that questionable, last show where he's standing in the community and it's like, they're here for you. You know, you did this, you know, she was the glue that really held everything together, her and her messed up.
Kendra: Selfishness.
Julia: Yeah. But it's just, yeah. Yup. Yeah. Yeah. That's
Kendra: awesome. Yeah. And you know, Emily doesn't get that from him. Like he gave to Lorelei in that same way, because of that scene that you're saying like, oh, you don't want her to become like me. You know, it's so interesting. But Emily is like his, um, his mother.
Kendra: Yeah, a little cat wasn't she? Wretched.
Julia: Oh my gosh. And then the dynamic money older dynamic. Yup. The dynamic always like made me chuckle because he's like, Hey tricks. And then she calls a mom and like, you're just kinda like what's going on here. Like you , and that's never explained on why he calls her tricks, which I think is actually kind of brilliant to not explain it.
Julia: Cause it leaves that mystery and it leaves that sort of like. View of confusion that I think Laurel I has when it comes to her parents dynamic with her grandmother. Um, but yeah. Yeah, he's an interesting, she's awful to
Kendra: Emily. Well, it kind of speaks to his relationship to Lorelei because it's much more relaxed and with Emily.
Kendra: Um, and so she can, he kind of experienced the same thing with tricks that he does with, with Laurel, although he does have experts, certain expectations, he does have that bit of casualness with her that Emily just can't manage. Yeah.
Julia: And you learn the Emily's fun throughout the show and that she has the ability to do that because when you see her interact with her Dar friends, you see similarities between Emily and Lorelai.
Julia: And, and it's so funny because I think we forget sometimes how much we can be like our parents, especially when we're like, I don't want to be like my parents, but I always thought that was a really good way to show that Emily and Laurel, I have a lot in common in the end anyway,
Kendra: so much like when, when Rory left college, how she was just so adamant and put her foot down and in a way that you would see Emily do and not expect her to do.
Kendra: And she basically channeled Emily in her response to Rory leaving college. Yeah. She
Julia: became her mother. Yes. Yes. And, you know, for all her faults, I felt like Emily was doing the best she could. And she was speaking in the best way that she could, but she comes from a generation that wasn't allowed to be anything, but what Emily became and it kind of hurts a little bit that Le not hurts me.
Julia: I mean, it just makes me sad that Laura, I never kind of got into a full position to fully understand generationally because, you know, Emily's the generation where she probably couldn't get a bank account without her husband. She probably couldn't get a home loan without her husband. Like she can't do anything without her husband, but then Laurel, I can do all these things.
Julia: Like you mentioned, she's basically on the path that Richard was, that that couldn't exist necessarily in, in Emily's time. And it really always broke my heart that they never gave Laura that, um, breakthrough moment to see that, like my mom was restricted by her generation and the expectations of the society at the time.
Julia: I think that
Kendra: comes. Hopefully it comes sooner in life, but I know for me personally, that did not come to me until I was in my fifties giving my age here, but I really started, I really came to a place where I realized some things about myself and my fifties that allowed me to unpack some things about my mother and I, you know, Yeah, wish it could have happened in my 30 forties.
Kendra: So it would be interesting if they were to do other episodes of Laura lie in the much older years. Um, if there would not be that kind of realization made.
Julia: Yeah. I'd love to see that. And like a second run dish. Cause they did a year in a life, which I really enjoyed and I know a lot of people didn't, but I was just like, okay, like this is Amy Sherman, Palladino classic Amy Sherman Palladino.
Julia: It doesn't matter what's happening in the world. She literally did right by the Gilmore girls. Like, um, but it would be interesting if they came back and did like another one and that was part of the narrative. Oh, I would love to see that. Yeah.
Kendra: Yeah. Cause she'll be, she would be a grandparent by then. And so, um, yeah, so I think that.
Kendra: You asked me earlier, like what I thought of Laurel, I later now when I watch it, sometimes it's so hard for me to watch it. Cause I think Lorelei is so incredibly selfish that someone just needs to go on puncher. I mean, some episodes I have to turn off because it's so blatant. But yet when I was younger, I was like, yeah, absolutely.
Kendra: I am right there on your bandwagon. So it's all where we sit at the table, the experiences we've had in life and you know, um, how we, uh, manage those experiences. Cause you could have the same experiences for me, but I got to process those differently. I'm a different person. So I may grow in areas you don't and
Julia: vice versa.
Julia: Yeah. Yeah. That's a really that's that's thank you for making that point because I think that nuance gets lost a little. Especially when it comes to like when it comes to us being women and just the D and, and regionally too, right? Like California is so different from Missouri and so different from Ohio.
Julia: And so, like, we forget that, like, we have our own little mini cultures within this bigger society. That is the U S and it's easy to forget that because we're so isolated. Like we were speaking offline a little bit, you know, we're kind of in our silos and we forget that other people live differently or similarly, and some of the same sort of structures that exist.
Julia: Different fractions. If people like it, everybody in poverty has the same sort of poverty hurdles. You know, some, it might look different depending on where you are and what your location is. Um, but in same with privilege, as with, we see with the hunts burgers and the Gilmore's, the Hunsberger burgers, don't see them the same.
Julia: The Hunsberger see themselves as better. They are powerful. They are, they have money. There's high expectations. You know, the Gilmore's have money. The Gilmore's have power. They came over on the Mayflower, like, but they are not viewed as equals even though they are like literally the 1%.
Kendra: Yeah. So interesting.
Kendra: That's so true. That's why I think travel is so important. You know, hanging outside of your area and you made the I'm actually from Missouri and I moved to the east coast and I will tell you, it is a struggle for me to go outside of, um, an area that's a little bit more and hopefully no one takes offense, uh, progressive in, in animal or, or human rights.
Kendra: Um, things like that. It is it's, you know, sometimes it's a little bit of a culture shock when I, when I go home and write. Don't do that much as much as I
Julia: should. I understand I'm an I'm in like literally the cattle land of California and I, you know, it's on the one hand, it's a huge part of our economy, almonds and cattle and dairy is a huge part of the economy of the part of California I'm in, but I'm in California.
Julia: So we get a lot of the, um, vegan and vegetarian narrative, which is fine. But it's hard for me to sort of understand where I fit in that, because it literally fuels the economy in which I live the whole fraction of California that I live. So it's, I don't know, like, yeah, there's just all these weird balances that you have to figure out.
Julia: And then when we do visit people out of state or family out of state, um, cause I do try to, we do up and down the west coast pretty often, um, during the summer. And I really, and I forget how different Oregon is compared to California and it's. That's been a huge part of my, um, parenting style is okay. So we're going to travel if we can.
Julia: And mostly it's funded from my parents because I'm solo parent with one income. Thank you, mom and dad. But I think it made a huge difference in shaping my son because then he can see like he was in Minnesota a couple of times and we visited family there and he could see how different Minnesota is and how people live in Minnesota.
Julia: He was five. I took him to New York city and, you know, he, he liked it, but I think he didn't like how fast it moved. And he made that decision at five and going to LA all the time and just little things like that, that we could potentially afford, just so he could see like, cause where we are. It is ag country.
Julia: I mean, if you hit the freeway or not the freeway, if you hit one of the back roads at the wrong time of day, you're stuck behind a tractor for an hour.
Kendra: Sounds like my kind of place. Yeah.
Julia: My cousin and I were talking the other day about how much we missed our grandparents, lived on a farm out in the country and we feel so lucky to have that dual life of like, we spent the summers on the farm and we spent our, you know, the school year in like a big small town.
Julia: So we got both. Um, but that's just like the story with the cow Trenton down the road.
Kendra: Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, again, it's like kind of see what you seek in the sense of like, I I've had comments made to me, like, why do you spend so much time on animal welfare when there's kids that need, but we all have different things put in us.
Kendra: If we were all just interested in. Everything else would go away. Literally it would just, I mean, so we all have different interests and different drivers and different things that pull us and it's just, it's just finding yours and, um, you know, a and then getting, I think, outside of your area to kind of, and I don't mean preach in a bad way, but kind of preacher, you know, maybe I should say it this way.
Kendra: Live your message.
Julia: Yeah. Yeah. Cause it's, I think hearing what other people's experience are, are, so is so important because you may not, like I told you earlier, I was thinking about you this week and just, you know, the conversation that we had around Sanford and son, and it just helped me. It helped remind me that there's so many different facets that people can relate to, and it's not isolated to one group of people.
Julia: And I, I appreciate that because it's, I need those reminders cause I'm so sucked into the world of representation and what that means for people like me, that I forget sometimes to see that bigger picture and what that means for, um, other folks as well, which isn't, you know, it's all part of how we come to an understanding to live harmoniously together.
Julia: Right. Laurel, I can never seem to achieve tie it back to our topic.
Kendra: Well, you know, and, and, uh, to your point, especially with her parents, for sure. But what about other people? I think that there are other people too, that if they just don't go along with her, there is no being with her max.
Julia: Yes. Oh, that broke my heart.
Julia: I love max Medina, max Medina. Like he was a solid strong man. And here's Google look at thank you. Um, but he just, he hit it for me. He hit all the markers of like, yeah, I would totally spend the rest of my life with a guy like that.
Kendra: I'm glad that they had him on the show and they did they dated because I think to your, I think most people that I've seen online or talk to feel the same way about him, but I just don't see it like longterm.
Kendra: I don't see how he could feed her. Does that make sense? Like just that mental side of, of wonder that she has not the wit part or the smart part, but that wonder side that I think he would be too consistent. And, um, what's the word I'm looking at? Like, um,
Julia: predictable. Yeah. Cause he has a pretty stable force.
Julia: He likes his routine. He likes, you know, he comes from a family that loves him, obviously, you know, he's, it's very, it's not obvious that Lorelei and Emily Love each other, but they do. Um, and yeah, I, and I think that, I think. I think that's kind of the point of max too, is that it wakes, it helps her kind of realize that she's not ready.
Julia: Yeah. Cause that conversation they have, he's like, what do I do with like worry comes home drunk. And she's like, bro, he's not going to come home drunk. Or like, what's my role in your world. And she's like, I just be here and he's like, that's not going to, no, that's not how this works. You know? And she's never thought it out in a longer term situation of how that's going to be.
Kendra: Well, that's how she's lived her whole life. Right. She's never really thought it out. I mean, except for the dragon fly she had to kind of, but even then that was just like, Hey, we were, we were going to do this in the future, but let's just do it now. I mean, and there's, there's so many good business people that do that by just following their gut and living their life like that.
Kendra: And, um, and, and how she does it. I think long-term I say that, but then, you know, the whole situation where Roy was going to go to Yale or sorry, um, Harvard, Harvard, thank you. And then went to Yale and she could not see past being flexible about that decision when she is nothing but flimsy flexible. Right.
Julia: Right. And it felt like for her, it felt like it was a personal attack, right? Like how dare you suggest that my child, and that's a thing that's being a legacy as a thing. That's a true blue thing that happens in, you know, the, um, Ivy league world. And just not even just Ivy leagues, but just university in general.
Julia: Like my dad was a lawyer and my dad's dad was a lawyer. That kind of thing. Like there was this expectation and Emily speech about like, did you ever consider that if worry goes to y'all, she'd come home on the weekends, that it might be easier for her to get into Yale because Richard went here and like lists all these very practical things and Laurel.
Julia: See it she's. So she's seeing red she's so
Kendra: mad. Right? Right. Yeah. I just thought that to me, there were certain scenes that just seem so outside of Laura Ally's script as a person. And that was one of them. And I know it was really more around, she felt, or she said she felt Roy was being manipulated to however, she knows her daughter well enough to know that if Roy was really wanting to make that change, that any other time, I think that she would be open to Roy making that change.
Kendra: But for some reason as fly the seat of the pants kind of person she is, and that had been planned from the beginning. And she was yet not able to. To break from that plan.
Julia: Yeah. Yeah. Because plans change. Sometimes they have to,
Kendra: it didn't match your character. I had a hard time with
Julia: that scene. Yeah, yeah.
Julia: Yeah. I understand that. I'm going through college stuff right now with my son and, you know, we're having those conversations. Let's wait and see what the offer like the financial aid offers are and like how we're going to navigate this. And, you know, he wants things to be super planned out. So he knows for sure what's going to happen for, you know, Mo moving forward.
Julia: And I'm like, we can't make decisions until we know for sure what we're being offered, because UCLA, if you got in isn't necessarily gonna offer us the same thing as like CSU San Diego. Like we don't, we just don't know. So we're ma we're trying to balance that right now is like being super planned, but then also we can't really plan.
Kendra: Right, right. Yeah. That's tough situation. Yeah. But then, um, the op options, the fact that he has options are awesome.
Julia: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I'm very grateful.
Kendra: This episode is brought to you by Hughes by Juul. He used by Juul offers, custom
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Julia: At 16 Lorelei is portrayed as wild and rebellious and uncontrollable girl whose parents, despite her best efforts are stuffy and stuck in their ways. Lorelei has no appreciation for the world in which she is raised. And by some measure treats her parents. In contrast when Rory is 16, Lorelei is the mother.
Julia: She wished she had being more pals than mom to her daughter in later episodes. Rory has decided to drop out of Yale Lorelei comments that in her past, she could pull out her mom card to get the outcome she wanted. But now that Rory's an adult, I'm using air quotes, that card is null and void. So I want to talk a little bit about there, the relationship between Emily and Lorelai.
Julia: And I think parents forget a lot that their children are individual humans with their own personalities. And you kind of made a really good point earlier about in this scenario, Laurel, I sort of morphed into an Emily in the case of the Gilmore's. Is this true? Do you think Laurel eyes high school rebellion never evolved beyond her 16 year old view?
Julia: Um,
Kendra: She she up until the very end, always rebelled against what her parents wanted from her. I think so every kid, once their parent to figure them out, because they don't know what they're, they are, you know, they're trying to figure themselves out. And so I lived in a, in a household where I w I don't know that I really figured myself out until I was much later, like in my forties.
Kendra: And I was just told to do things, and this is what you do. And, um, sort of the household that Sheila den, she had to be a certain way act a certain way. So I, you know, Maybe until after Richard's death in, in those episodes, but she always rebelled. She always wanted to be her own. Oh, she could not handle someone else being in control.
Kendra: Um, but you can almost control the oral alive by trying
Julia: to control her if that makes sense.
Kendra: Um, but I, I, in some ways I don't think it was fair that Laurel, I, Hey, Rory, let's have this friendship from the time you were born until now. And then all of a sudden I'm gonna play this really strict mom card and say, you can't go and do this.
Kendra: It goes, it flies in the face of everything, you know, your full, um, what, 20 years or whatever she was at the time. And this one time I'm going to put my foot down and demand you do something. Oh, my gosh, she didn't. Well, what, what do you, I mean, that's basically what you did to your parents, however, because they say, you know what?
Kendra: You get your, you get what you deserve in your kid. Right. And I don't mean that in a necessarily negative way. One reason why I did not have children, one of many reasons. Cause I know the child that I was. Um, but I just. That one time. She truly, and not that there were weren't other times where she was parenting, but this was the time where she was like, no matter what, I'm going to put my foot down, and this is what you're going to do and was surprised it didn't happen.
Julia: Right. Right. Because the only other scenario where I can think that she does do this whole sternness is when Rory doesn't want to go to Chilton in the first couple of episodes in the beginning of the series, because she's met Dean and maybe she doesn't want to go to Chilton and all these things, and she's like, you're going to Chilton, that's it.
Julia: And that's literally the only other time I can recall were Relora light. Does that sort of like, I'm the actual parent here, like, it's, this is a serious life decision and I'm the parent and I'm playing the parent card every other time. I think about when she plays the parent card, it's like.
Julia: Inconsequential. It's not serious. It's done in jest. It's not life altering decisions. And so her, I feel like she never, I feel like she never really did move out of that mind frame of like, my parents are terrible humans, you know, we all go through that phase. But then as you mentioned yourself, you went through a phase where you kind of came to an understanding.
Julia: And I, and I, and I did something similar to where it was like, oh, how do I have a relationship with my parents where we are all happy? Because I feel like that's normal. I, and maybe it's not, but I feel like that's a natural progression in life to do. Like, I now know who I haven't lived with you guys for a number of years.
Julia: So now I have an opportunity to figure out who I am without you, Laurel. I does that. But then she doesn't really, because she's still holding on to all of the things. That happened to her in her childhood. And Emily calls her out on that a couple of times, like, don't make this a crusade about your childhood.
Julia: We're talking about what's right for Rory, we're talking about what's right for the family kind of stuff. And she can't ever get beyond that tiny scope and see the bigger picture. And for all of Richard and Emily's faults, they do regularly can see a bigger picture and whether or not they're trying to manipulate the situation into what they want.
Julia: Almost doesn't matter to me because they can see, like, this is the bigger picture we have to talk about the bigger picture you need to stop focusing on this little dot.
Kendra: Right? Right. No, that's a very good perspective. That's very true. And Laurel, I never, um, admits to the fact that she wants that relationship with.
Kendra: That she has with Rory, and that's why she left at 16, but she never, um, at least the show never lets us see that she tries to meet Emily in some way. Like even when Emily tries to be loosey goosey and those things, it just doesn't work out. But, um, you never see Laura lie, um, Oni up or a set accepting that Emily can't ever be that.
Kendra: So this is the relationship that I need to have with her versus just punishing her all the time, because she can't be what she has for Rory. Right.
Julia: When you say that, I specifically think of the episode where they go to the spa and
Julia: and then it doesn't pan out and like, and then Emily just loses it and then they totally crumble and fall. And I think you make a really good point. It's you have to figure out what your relationship. With your parents and then set boundaries. So that way you don't have those blowouts and fallouts. And that's really hard because we don't talk about that as a society.
Julia: We don't talk about how we don't give anybody tools on how to do that, because there's this con there's this idea that family is family, no matter what, which is nice sometimes, right? Like we, like what if spending an over extended amount of time with my family ends up leaving me feeling drained and sad and maybe bordering on like a little depression.
Julia: Like where's the line? Like, how do I come out of this still? Okay. And not damaging my relationship further with my family.
Kendra: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, in that scene with the spa, instead of. Celebrating the, um, the moment that they had, because she had Emily to a point and it just pushed too far. If she, you know, when dancing with that, me, that was just too far.
Kendra: If staying at the bar, eating at the bar, eating the peanuts, maybe saying hi to the man. If she had just recognized, Hey, look at what my mom's meeting me here, halfway with all of this, let me be happy with this. Instead of pushing it even further. And you know, it could have acknowledged instead of just leaving and doing the whole rope thing, which I thought was kind of dumb because they're just going to charge your credit card.
Kendra: So
Julia: they're not cheap. They're like always like a hundred and some bucks, like, no. Yeah.
Kendra: And honestly, I don't stay places that have ropes,
Kendra: but they could have. Stated. I mean, Emily didn't have to blow up like that. She didn't, but it was just pushed too much if she hadn't pushed her outside of our bubble, that wouldn't have happened, but they just think that there was a missed opportunity. Like, Hey, we had a moment push it too far, but yet we had this moment and that happens with family.
Kendra: Right? So, um, like you're saying, getting together with family and you'll have a nice moment. And then all of a sudden the sun, you know, does something goes a little bit too far. Someone gets a little bit too, uh, ribbing on someone or joking, and then it just blows the whole moment. And we can't ever get that back.
Kendra: I thought that was a little bit of a life lesson missed opportunity that could have been in the writing. And I, that's not many areas. I'm not a writer, so I'm not saying that's not good writing, but throughout every single episode, we can all see how things could go a little different. Right. But that's where I think even the writers I think could have, um, uh, been true to the characters and done that because I think that there was a really good moment there.
Kendra: Yeah.
Julia: I loved when they were kind of bonding together. Like it was just so nice to see them having a mother, daughter relationship and adulthood that they've never had before. And it was just to see it explode in that way was just really heartbreaking because you're just like, come on, we need, we need growth.
Julia: We need you to grow a little bit and give us something more than just you. Two are volatile together.
Kendra: Even from the very beginning of the episode where Emily calls and like, oh, I had the silent auction and I've got this spa. She pulled a Laurel eye on aura, like, oh, you know, Hey, do you want to just go, you know, you want it?
Kendra: Oh yeah. I'd love it. Okay. Well then both of us will go. I mean, right from the get-go Emily was being a little playful, the whole episode.
Julia: Um, she was into it. She was like, yeah, with my girl and they
Kendra: both met it. So in Laurel, I went to the spa. Yeah. Did those things met her there? Laura? I don't know. I just thought that to your point.
Kendra: I think that's a really good point would have liked to have seen in some areas, um, a little bit better of progression in their relationship, but again, to your point, it's truly always there because. When mama bear sees that her Cubs are being hurt by the hunts burgers or whatever mama bear comes out. It doesn't matter if Laurel, I went to the spa with her.
Kendra: It doesn't matter if floral I miss Friday, she, you know, you hurt my Cub. You're going to see
Julia: mama bear. I love that scene where she rips up Shira. And I know it's like, w like, so anti, like female empowerment, but it was just that Mo like what you said that moment where you're just like, here comes Emily and she's so well connected.
Julia: She knows how to cut you down because you cut her kids.
Kendra: And I think that's the real Emily I would have liked to have seen. I don't mean putting people down, right. Say, um, cause I will say. That the opening scene of the, um, the remakes, the seasons where they're like putting everybody down at the pool. I don't, that really bother me, but I do think that that's really Emily.
Kendra: Like, I would have loved to have seen that stronger to the point in your face, but in a, for your family kind of way.
Julia: Yeah. Right, right. Hey friends. Did you know that I have spoken about representation in media and literature, other than just on the podcast. I've been booked to speak at company meetings, panel discussions, voiceovers for commercials and video narratives and to moderate discussion panels.
Julia: To learn more about how you can book me for an event, just shoot me an email pop culture makes me jealous@gmail.com. You speaking engagement as the subject line, looking forward to working with. And a 2020 reflection in the New York times writer saw Australis said, quote, the idea for the show was to tell the story of a bookish teenaged girl, whose best friend was her 30 something mother.
Julia: The backdrop would be an idyllic, Connecticut town full of oddballs and eccentrics, and the tone would be a blend of character driven comedy and drama, all set in a screwball place. And no more girls was released when I was in high school worry, and I could have been peers if there were a real world and we lived in the same state.
Julia: But for you conjure, what was it like watching Gilmore girls and being closer to Loreleis age than Rory's age? Because for me it was like, oh my God, I'm Rory. Like this is life. Like all my, you know, I've got my best friend and I've got these cute boys and school and stress about college, but watching it now as a parent, I'm like, oh my God, not the chaotic stuff, but just like the whole being a parent.
Julia: You
Kendra: know, when I first started watching the show, I actually. Had a more drawn to Rory, like why couldn't I have been like that as a kid? Um, and I mean, I was me and I was a very, I was home. Reficar really shy. I mean, horrifically shy and not that Roy didn't have her shy moments, but she. You know, for them as much as she could be as a kid was, was quite sure of herself.
Kendra: She knew what she liked and she was able to do it. So I think when I first started watching the show, it was like, wow. You know, I think that's really what I would have liked for myself as being a kid and, and yes, having that cool mom. And now that I'm older, I don't view her as a cool mom. Wow. I'd like to have a friend like that.
Kendra: I would like to have, uh, a cool mom friend. And in that sense, you know, her and Sophie's relationship I thought was, um, was, was so enjoyable and fun, but so supportive, um, and, and very authentic. Um, but yeah, so I had longed for, I longed for being able to be. Open to be yourself as a kid. When I first started watching the show and that does relate to having a mom that got her.
Kendra: So I didn't a lot of the pulp, um, pop culture references if they have on the show. I mean, I know them now, but I didn't necessarily get involved in that. When I was that age, I wasn't necessarily able to listen to certain kinds of music. I wasn't able to see some movie, like I couldn't go visit a girlfriend if she had a brother.
Julia: Oh.
Kendra: So, you know, and, and depending on who it was, maybe I would be able to go visit, but I definitely could never spend the night with that girlfriend because she had a brother. My dad went as far as to tell my best friend, as long as you're friends with my daughter, you need to not. Oh, my God. Wow. So, and she was just like, um, you're not my dad,
Kendra: that's a whole other conversation, but yeah, I, I just want the freedom to be her, right. Because she could walk around the town. Um, I didn't grow up in like a little neighborhood. I grew up on a five lane highway. Wow. With top, but, but it was enough property behind us. We had goats, we had chickens. We had rabbits.
Kendra: My next door neighbor was a beauty salon. Two doors down was a burger king across the street was a circle. K. And at night I can hear people. I like to tacos Rito at the taco bell.
Julia: That's a really unique experience. I've never, I've never met anybody who kind of like. The backyard property situation. And then you have people ordering talkable.
Julia: That's that's wild.
Kendra: There was no house. I didn't grow up in like this. So she had this community where she could go out and about in and wow. Long to have that freedom. That's what I saw in that show. My first started watching it. And in of course the parent that gave her a very protected environment to let her
Julia: be her.
Julia: Um, yeah. Yeah. It's, it's funny. Cause my sister and I talk sometimes about how like all the little things that happen in stars hollow, like, can we please like make that real, like the, um, the all night 24 dance marathon where everyone dresses, like it's the 1940s. Like I would be so here for that or when they didn't fit on my basket.
Julia: Yeah. I
Kendra: love the movie night with that and we all need a, oh, what's his name? I told I forgot his name. Yes, we all
Julia: need a girl. And he's so funny. So Jay, uh, Sean Gunn and his brothers, James Gunn, who's part of, he's redirected a bunch of movies and part of the Marvel universe. And so he, when my son and I went to see guardians of the galaxy and James and Sean Ben was in it, I was like, Kirk, what are you doing here?
Julia: It's supposed to be like anything, but
Kendra: Kirk, it's weird to see him in. Yeah. Yeah. Totally agree. Cause I've seen a number like a Western one. Yeah. I'm pretty sure it was a wet like or some or something. Yeah. Yeah. Oh my
Julia: gosh. Oh, so weird. He was such a great character on the show though. He was just the right amount of quirky where you're left going, but he's entertaining.
Julia: I wanted to kind of circle back though, about your comment about, um, Suki and Laura relationship. I always thought that was the best version of Laura. As an adult, because she was so supportive and loving of Suki and gave Sage advice and was a voice of reason. And Suki was the same for her. And you really got to see.
Julia: A grown-up version of Lorelei in that, because sometimes she was a little too kid with Rory and she really was a kid with her parents. And when she's flirting with the guys, you know, having this dating situation, you don't really get a good sense of like how her maturity level, I guess, is where I'm going.
Julia: And with Suki really, really CA and they just love and support each other so much. Um, and it just that I loved that aspect. And when, um, Melissa McCarthy, when they only brought her, when she was only able to come back for one of the episodes for the year in a life, it really bummed me out because they were such a huge part of the show working.
Kendra: Yes. Yes. I, I love that view of that. It's so true. You actually get to see a Lorelei and. Who she really is because yes, that relationship with Rory is that relationship with Roy, but that's not her like when Rory leaves, who is Lorelei. Yeah. And that's when you see her and that's so true, I've not really thought and put it into words like that.
Kendra: That's really cool. Or her relationship with Michelle, you know, as a boss, you know, friend is another time you get to see her just as a person.
Julia: Yeah. Yeah. Cause I think
Kendra: her and Luke and all of those, that's her. Yes, they were friends, but there's always been something there. And so, yeah, that's the only time you get to see that.
Kendra: I always really bummed too that Suki, uh, wasn't there because, um, I think there is another opportunity cause to these kids as they got older and to see that relationship with aunt Laura,
Julia: yes. She doesn't have to be the parent. She can finally be, that's what, that's kind of the role I'm in now with my friend's daughter, she's nine and a half years younger than my son.
Julia: And I get to do all the fun things that I would never do as a mom,
Julia: much to my friends dismay. I mean, I don't do anything that would upset my friend, but you know, cause it's Al at the end of the day, like that's her kid, I'm not going to make her life more miserable. It's a different kind of relaxation when it's not your kid, you get to have more fun. You get to be, I don't know, a little bit more free.
Julia: Like now it's like, okay, so he's my son's 17. He's a senior in high school. We survived. And, and when your kids are seven, you don't re you think like, oh my God, we're never gonna make it out a lot. So I get to have fun now with the seven year old, whereas 10 years ago, I was like, are we going to survive?
Julia: What's happening? I don't know if I can make it to Friday.
Kendra: Yeah. I'm the, um, I'm the aunt to my friend's kids. Like I bought the really loud toy I bought when they couldn't say the word truck and said something else had been repeated everywhere constantly, you know, like that. Yeah.
Julia: Oh, I love that. Oh, my gosh, Kendra.
Julia: Thank you so much for your time today and coming onto the show to talk about this, this particular element of Gilmore girls. I really appreciate it. Do you want to share with our friends at home where they can find you if they want to keep up with you on that?
Kendra: Sure. So I am the I triple over flat surfaces podcast and you can go to the website at the same name.
Kendra: I am, wherever you get your podcasts. My podcast is about encouraging you to take control of your thoughts to live a better life. I am an aggressive encourager. That's so important to me. So I would love it if you went and listened and, um, I hope to be back. This was so much fun. I absolutely love this.
Julia: I really, I really do.
Julia: I know, I say I enjoy people's company a lot, but I really did enjoy this conversation. Like the time just flew, I'm looking at the clock and I was like, holy buckets, how did we get them already? Like, didn't we just start talking that doesn't happen all the time. Friends. Thank you so much for tuning in a pop culture makes me jealous as written, edited, and produced by me, Julia Washington.
Julia: You can find us on Instagram. If you want to hang out with us in between episodes. Pop culture makes me jealous. Thanks for tuning in y'all until next time.
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