Grand Valley, you do not know the struggle I went through to get you this column. I had my own personal “127 Hours” experience when I tried to retrieve a stuck candy bar from the vending machine and got my arm jammed in there. I was about to remove it via continuous paper cut with a syllabus from my creative writing class when a passerby kindly suggested I rotate my arm a little to the left.

But the good news is, I still have my arm, so I can type. The bad news is, I won’t be making disability when the Lanthorn only prints a few issues over the summer.

Speaking of painful experiences that provide no meaningful value to your daily life, let’s talk about Good Morning America.

A recent piece by Good Morning America’s Juju Chang has got me all in a tistle. Chang followed the 7-year-old Samantha Shaw through the process of plastic surgery. Something the girl’s mother endorsed.

You see, Shaw was born with a condition called “Cup Ears,” or to some, “Obama Ears.” But she also had an abnormal fold over her right ear. Her mother explained that a primary reason the surgery was needed was to prevent bullying.

“When she was younger, she got called monkey ears,” Mommy Shaw told Chang.

I say that’s ludicrous! You don’t stop a bully from picking on your child by getting that child plastic surgery. You stop a bully by drop-kicking that little twerp in the face. Or by killing his puppy.

But Mommy Shaw wasn’t the only one to believe in Samantha’s surgery. The operation was funded entirely by the Little Baby Face Foundation, and while this may sound like a school for aspiring mobsters, it is in fact something far more sinister – an organization that wants to steal your baby’s face.

The Little Baby Face Foundation helps pay for plastic surgery for children with facial issues. But secretly, I believe they want to transform all children into Sarah Jessica Parker, the human-alien hybrid.

But some would argue that this plastic surgery is simply “correcting a birth defect”, no different than getting braces or eye surgery. But to that, I say, no sir! I believe if you’re born with a birth defect, you should be stuck with it because that’s the way God made you.

That’s why I never had my sixth finger removed. It makes me who I am. I’d like to believe when God created me, he chuckled and said, “This one’s going to be a little weird.”

And I’ve had no bad experiences with that finger except this guy named Inigo Montoya keeps calling my house and making death threats, but I think he has me confused for someone else.

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