Reader-Response to John Updike’s “A&P”

“Sammy, you don’t want to do this to your Mom and Dad,” he tells me. It’s true, I don’t. But it seems to me that once you begin a gesture it’s fatal not to go through with it (323). This statement made by Sammy after quitting his job, was made towards the end of John Updike’s story “A&P”. Sammy had quit his job, a job that his parents helped him to get. Sammy opened up a whole new world; a world that I don’t think Sammy was ready for. He made a quick and irrational decision, rather if it affected his life or not we would never know. One could make the assumption that yes he was affected, because he possibly brought shame to his parents. With it being a small town word gets around fast a there is a chance that Sammy wouldn’t be able to find a job any other place because of how he had quit he job prior. Sammy labeled the people whom were in the store as “sheep pushing their carts down the aisle” (321), as in how people were expected to act in society, being constrained, unable to be yourself. Sammy was different; he was an adolescent male who was just trying to find his way through life. A life where he wasn’t familiar with, he was socially inept and lacked a good education as you can tell from the language he used. Life was just about to change for Sammy. John Updike’s story teaches us that we don’t always have to have good reasons for the choices we make. Some of the choices we make are strictly based on our feelings and beliefs. Sometimes, young adults can make some drastic decisions without realizing the effects of the decisions they make and how they could affect others. These decisions could have a negative impact on their lives. For example, when Sammy quit his job at the A&P, he didn’t realize that during that time in 1961 people were very judgmental. Those “sheep” (321) that he spoke of, were the same “sheep” (321) that were going to judge his parents by the way he portrayed himself. Some decisions can also have a positive impact on a young adults life. Take Sammy for example, just because he quit his job that his parents helped him to get, this didn’t mean that he would have never be successful in life. Sammy lived in a small town in New England; there were not a lot of large businesses there, just a small quaint town. If I had of been in the same predicament, and had quit my job. I would have moved to a bigger town that offered a broader working experience, a broader lifestyle. That opportunity would have given me a way to make a better life for myself. With Sammy being so socially incompetent that would have given him a better opportunity to interact and become more sociable with other people. Sammy’s experience gave me a personal insight to an experience I once had while being employed at Kroger. The location of the Kroger I was working at was just about to have a grand opening. We had all gathered to the front of the store to have a store meeting to prepare for the opening. Our manager at the time was speaking to us and just telling us about how he was expecting everyone to be on his or her tasks. He wanted to make sure that no one had any questions or concerns of their jobs. A couple of questions were asked to the manager and he answered them one by one accordingly. All of a sudden he begins to express his feelings of how we would like for us to act, saying things like, “Act like you all have some type of manners”. I am listening to him and then he just says “I don’t understand why some of you black people can’t get along”. I look with shock at first like, what did he just say? I look at my other peers and they are looking just as shocked as I was. I looked at the manager and I said, “I really don’t know who you think you are, but I refuse to work under a racist boss. I deserve better than this”. That was the one and the only time, where I got up and walked off of my job. I felt as though Sammy had felt at the time, confident. I was confident with my reason for quitting and I knew that I didn’t have to take that verbal abuse. I knew at that time that I had other opportunities waiting for me, greater promises. Most people at one time wanted to be a hero; they wanted to be able to say they saved or changed someone life. In contrast, to the year that this story was written in being 1961, there could have been a place for heroism. World War II was ending and the Civil Rights movement was broadening. The world was going through a major transition. Now, with it being the year 2015 and seeing how the world has changed so drastically since 1961, most people aren’t able to just quit and walk off of their jobs. People still have bills to pay, families to care of. The world is so fast paced with things changing everyday right before your eyes. We all have this one thing, maybe more that we would love to change about of jobs but we can’t. That is when a lot of us may need some guidance or someone to talk to, a peacemaker so to speak. We just cannot quit or jobs when things tend to get a little rough around the edges. You just have to hold on and know that it’s not all bad. Tomorrow will be a better and brighter day.

Works Cited
Updike, John. “A&P. Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing, Compact Edition. Ed. Edgar V. Roberts and Robert Zweig. 6th ed. New York: Pearson, 2015. 320-24. Print.