Eunice Brownlee | Gilmore Girls Ruined Me for Single Motherhood

Gilmore Girls Ruined Me for Single Motherhood

By Eunice Brownlee

I spent almost the entirety of my pregnancy looking forward to a new episode of “Gilmore Girls” every Tuesday night. I had been watching the show since it debuted because I connected with the strained relationship that Lorelai had with her mother Emily. As I felt my own little girl tumbling around in my belly, I watched and imagined that someday she and I would be just like Lorelai and Rory.

We never got to see Lorelai with all of her sleepless nights and how she managed to work her way up at the inn with a child in tow. If her journey was anything like mine, she probably worked with Rory strapped to her chest when she could or had Rory chilling in an unattended infant swing hidden away from guests when she couldn’t. While I was grateful for an employer that allowed me to bring an infant to work, I never stopped feeling guilty for tucking her out of sight while I corralled wedding guests. With no health insurance, no paid leave and an income of $12.50 an hour, I had to go back to work far sooner than I was emotionally ready for.

We didn’t watch Lorelai sort through bags of hand-me-downs — a gift that would free up her meager income to afford an unexpected Jeep repair, but I’m sure she did. We got a glimpse of her trying to be present at all of Rory’s school functions while also trying to juggle her career and a small social life, a dance that I learned very quickly, but never really got great at doing.

We didn’t see all of the trials and tribulations that led to forming the bond that we saw in Lorelai and Rory, but I like to think that their journey was similar to ours. We would spend oodles of time perfecting our outfts for

the school’s Fun Run or the annual Pride parade. We even went as Scarlet Overkill and a Minion one Halloween, and we had a blast putting those costumes together. We had regular ice cream dates and it wasn’t Friday night if we didn’t follow gymnastics practice with freckled lemonades and bottomless fries at Red Robin.

I dreamed about spending our mornings drinking coffee in a local café, talking about how unlike my mother I am (It’s almost eerie how much my own mother is like Emily). As I ate ice cream from a bowl carefully balanced on my baby bump, I imagined all of the ways that we would be just like Lorelai and Rory. I wanted nothing more than to be that single mother-daughter duo who defed conventional wisdom left and right.

Of course, she would make questionable choices and I would discipline her accordingly, but she would always know how very much I loved her. We would fght and make up over a movie night with far too much takeout food — or yet another cup of coffee. We would banter back and forth, and when she had her heart broken, I would be there with just the right spread of junk food, to help her deal with her feelings.

While I am like Lorelai in many ways, my daughter could not be less like Rory. She hates school. She has zero plans to attend college. I don’t think she even has an idea of what she wants to do with her life. There were several months where the local police knew her well enough to greet her with, “Why am I seeing you again?” While she didn’t steal a boat with her boyfriend like Rory, she was getting herself into situations that she was extremely lucky to have gotten out of with merely a handful of community service hours.

I particularly looked forward to the teenage years hoping that my daughter and I would have an open relationship and share our secrets, unlike the relationship I had with my mother. I believed that we would be close like friends, but like Lorelai and Rory, I would still be able to be the mom when the situation called for it.

Instead of pouring all of her thoughts, hopes and dreams into our conversations, she has those with her best friend’s mom. It’s almost unnerving to me how much a virtual stranger knows about my life when I know very little about hers. Every now and again, my daughter will open up and tell me things, and the dream feels a little more alive . . . .

Instead of being the place where all the kids crash, I’m not the house where all the kids hang out. In fact, none of my daughter’s friends want to hang out at our house. I’m not sure how much of that is because my kid is embarrassed about where we live, or her friends just think I’m an uptight asshole. In fairness, I think you would lose your shit too, if you woke up and had more kids at your house than were there when you went to bed at 1:00 a.m. After that incident, I think word got out, and no one comes over anymore.

I try to be chill and easygoing, but truth be told, I don’t like most of my daughter’s friends. Some of that is because of the anger I still harbor for their complicity in the legal troubles she found herself in. At least she fnally dumped the gangbanger she was dating, and her current boyfriend is a doll (as is his mom).

I imagined mother-daughter weekends away where we would pamper ourselves and make memories that she would look back on with fondness. So far, the most memorable trip we’ve taken was the time we went to visit friends in Illinois.

Due to a signifcant fight delay, we found ourselves getting into Chicago at 3:00 a.m. and I made the decision to head directly to the train station instead of trying to fnd a hotel room for a couple of hours. Little did I know that Union Station closes from midnight to 5:00 a.m. Unable to fnd a 24-hour diner nearby, we ended up hanging out on the sidewalk out front, while a guy with no arms wandered back and forth yammering about something. It was hard to discern fellow passengers waiting for the station to open from people who were simply sleeping on the streets. I will never forget the sense of relief that came over me when a janitor spied us, and he let us in at 4:00 a.m. to wait safely inside. I really hope my mother never reads this because I swore I would never tell her about this little mishap.

My daughter and I do talk about how my mom can sometimes be truly intolerable. We have bonded in our own way during the many hours spent on road trips. She recently joined me after my discovery of how horrifyingly awesome the Bachelor/ette franchise is. I love listening to her yell at the TV, as though the contestants can hear her.

As it turns out, she really loves shopping. Me, not so much. Our outings to the mall usually start well and then end up with us fghting, because

if she asks me one more time if I like something and I answer with an honest “yes” and she tells me I’m lying, I will snap and ditch her right in the middle of Macy’s.

We don’t have those TV perfect moments like — ever (and I know no one does). But what we do have is an unbreakable bond, forged by our shared experience as mother and daughter, out in the world alone — together — surviving everything life has thrown at us so far.

I wouldn’t trade that for all the cups of coffee in the world.

Eunice Brownlee has spent her career fnding the balance between her left and right brains. She is a passionate writer and writes regularly about mental health, trauma, and abuse. She’s also a solo mother, striving to raise a daughter who is strong and outspoken. Eunice has been published in The Kindred Voice, Motherscope and Spoken Black Girl. Eunice’s current project is a book about the trauma of navigating the justice system as a victim of a crime. When she’s not doing any of the above, she can be found seeking her next passport stamp and drinking wine. Follow her on Instagram @eunicebrownlee.

Engage with Eunice’s Story:

Think back to a parental fgure or family unit, real or imagined, that you looked up to and imagined being like in the future. In what ways did this comparison let you down or complicate your own experience as a parent?