I think that in A&P the author describes how life was decades ago and how it seems to me how life should be today, with out the arguments over petty situations. I think that the story line of A&P is a typical situation in a small town in which the story is situated. I think that this particular story is based in a small vacationing town on the east coast where familys come back every year to spend there summer days in the sun playing on the beach or in the ocean, where mothers can send there kids to the store barefoot and not have to orry about strange people kidnapping them.
Where customers have been coming for years and are treated with the respect you would treat someone in your own family. Sammys role in this story seems to be a strange one. He seems to be a teenager yet somehow attracted physically to adolescent girls. He seemed to be in a ways stalking the girls and making sexual notations towards them. Of course I am sure that three girls walking into a grocery store in nothing but bathing suits is not normal but considering the size and type of town I think that it is cceptable.
This strikes me in a bad way because first of all its not normal to see little kids in anyway but little kids who like having a good time. Secondly, why would you quit your job in front of little kids to try and impress them or maybe make them feel better that someone was on there side because of the incident that the check out line and Mr. Lengal. It seems so childish how people make a big deal out of something that is so tiny that people often forget what they are arguing about when it really comes down to it.