Alan Sillitoe: Self Analysis

Throughout my tenure as a courtesy clerk (bagger) at Kroger, I engaged in various acts of petty rebellion. However, in my final days employed there, I had moved from fruitless anger and focused it into an organized protest, one that had an impact on both myself and the store, if only for a day. Similar to the actions Smith took in The Loneliness of The Long-Distance Runner, by Alan Sillitoe, my behavior was one that resulted from a conflict between personal principles, and a hatred for arbitrary authority and abuse of position by “the man,”

Smith and I hold the same philosophy, in essence, of power.”If only ‘them’ and ‘us’ had the same ideas we’d get on like a house on fire,” (1205) the managerial staff of Kroger certainly had an “us versus …show more content…
The managerial staff, who was, with exceptions, as despicable as the manager himself, wrote the weekly schedules, and requested students submit their available hours during school weeks. I informed my superiors that I could work no more than twenty hours a week, as I was in several demanding AP and honours courses, in which they obliged. However, the following week, the schedule was posted and it revealed a hefty forty-hour week, identical to several other students who had also requested shorter workweeks. After confronting the person directly responsible for writing the schedule, I was promised to see my desired workload the next schedule, and they couldn’t offer me enough apologies. Next week, however, the story remained the same, this time I was told that we did not have enough baggers to allow half of the workforce to work so little hours. At this time, I had been an employee for approximately a year and a half, and I was getting tired of the drama and anger that resided in that toxic store, so I presented an ultimatum in which I was a victor in either way; either shorten my hours to where I’ve said they need to be, or I will quit immediately. Thinking they called my bluff, they essentially said “suck it up and deal with it,” but I was steadfast in my position and told them I quit. They had promised me that if I stayed I was being vetted for a higher position in the store, (maybe even in diary!) and I just had to hang on a little longer, but I held strong, and I walked out of the doors of that store and have not looked back, my actions even encouraged quite a few others to quit as well, leaving the store viciously understaffed for a week or so, until they could hire more of us. The situation was almost parallel to that of Smith, who was promised a future of social mobility and an immensely easier workload throughout the rest of his stay