Example Of How Sammy Seizes And How He Fails To Seize The Day In A&P By John Essay

Carpe diem is a latin aphorism that means seize the day. That means to take advantage of an opportunity to do something that you want without worrying about the future. The phrase is significant in “A&P” by John Updike whereby Sammy is expected to seize the day in some occasions. Sammy is the main character in A&P a short story by John Updike. The story focuses on a single day in the life of the nineteen year old Sammy, who is a grocery store clerk. Sammy is distracted by the entry of three ladies dressed in nothing but swimsuits and he is filled with all the desires of a young man his age. Sammy takes every detail of each of the girls during their visit. Coming in is Lengel, the store manager, who confronts the girls. Lengel reprimands the girls for their inappropriate attire and tells them that they can only return once they are properly dressed.
Sammy is stuck in something that he does not want; something that he feels is too small for him since he has bigger goals and ambitions. For nearly the whole story, Sammy is where he doesn’t want to be: annoyed and dressed in an apron and bow tie which formed the uniform for the A&P clerk. His mind was always running around the store, keeping itself busy by judging the customers, their purchases and shopping habits. His greatest distraction is the arrival of three young girls dressed in bathing suits. Unlike how he judges other customers, Sammy does not judge them. On the contrary, he appraises the trio. As Sammy is taking his time to study the ladies, his manager Mr. Lengel comes out to the girls and lets them know that they are indecently dressed and they should leave and come back when they are properly dressed. The embarrassment caused on the girls causes Sammy to rise to seize the day and steps up with an early retirement notice. He quits his job. He had high expectations that this gesture will come with a romantic reward. However, much to his surprise the girls fail to observe his heroic gesture. Despite that he does not change his mind. What he gets is a lecture from his manager, Lengel.
Sammy seized the day by leaving what he never wanted. He did that not considering what the future had in store. He looks at other men in the store and realizes that he doesn’t desire to be like them. He never wanted to be like Stokesie, who was stuck to this job because he wanted to provide for his family. Neither did Sammy wish to be like McMahon the middle-aged butcher. The worst of all, he never wanted to be like Lengel, the characterless, rule follower manager who had virtues that were middle class. His gesture is seen as liberation, he does not see how he would have done it in any other way. Though this leaves him stranded and at odds with the only society he was familiar with. He was sure that, “the world will be hard to me, hereafter” (196).
Sammy fails to seize the day by accepting the call for a second chance. The manager, Lengel, was a friend to Sammy’s parents for many years and did not welcome the idea of Sammy quitting. The manager tried to persuade him not to disappoint his parents and gives him a chance to take back his words. He tried to convince him to change his mind, “Sammy, you do not want to do this to your mom and dad,” he tells me. Sammy goes ahead to fold the apron with his name stitched on the pocket, and put it on the counter and placed the bow tie on top of it. “You will feel this for the rest of your life,” Lengel says. Sammy knows that those words are true but remembering how the manager made those girls blush he had no regrets. Sammy feels, “that once you begin a gesture it is fatal not to go through with it” (196). Therefore he moves forward even though he doesn’t know where this decision will take him. That’s the price he pays for seizing the day.
Sammy failed to seize the day since he did not get to know the girls at a personal level as any man his age would wish. Being admired and noticed are important and Sammy yearned for these things. By the time he finished with the manager, the girls were already gone and there was nobody but some young married women screaming with their children. His noble gesture doesn’t make the slightest impression, and he loses his job over nothing.
Sammy does not disclose the source of his actions or what prompted him to act as he did. However from the plot it is his moral sensitivity and sexuality that pushed him to his actions. His actions lead him to an indefinite future in which he may or may not find viable options. It is romantic desires that lead individuals to do things that show their naivety and cause drama in their lives