How to Write a Perfect Ship

Luke and Lorelai are the perfect ship, even if they aren’t your ship; in fact — that’s part of the appeal

Lorelai thinks she did it all on her own

But Luke actually did. His dad left him a hardware store but he built a restaurant instead. He was raised small town, blue collar, sister ended up on drugs and a mess, why did he succeed? He did the thing Lorelai always claimed to have done.

Lorelai thinks she wants grand gestures and sweeping romance.

But when Chris proposes in Paris, it gives her the ick. When Max proposes with thousands and thousands of yellow daisies, it makes her pause. And looking at a broader picture of thing, when Emily and Richard try to give her extravagant gifts, she recoils. She really prefers quiet acts of service over grand gestures and public displays.

Lorelai thinks she wants everything exactly her way.

But when Luke pushes back, when he takes charge of a situation, she loves him more than ever. When he oversteps his boundaries as her boyfriend (not Rory’s father, in other words) and makes plans to get Rory back on the Yale path, that’s when Lorelai proposes.

And note: she proposes in private, quietly, in an impromptu fashion, without any overt display of affection. The opposite of what she demanded of Max.

These seeming contradictions are at the core of a perfect ship.