I’ve often thought that the animal movement was not for the faint of heart. You confront painful things if you take a meaningful look into animal cruelty in society, and that can be a little dangerous for your emotional health. One of the best antidotes is a sense of humor, or at least an appreciation of humor. Just like eating well and exercising, we all need to laugh if we are to stay healthy—especially so if you do animal protection work.

© Long Photography
Carol Leifer (right) and partner Lori Wolf
at The HSUS's Genesis Awards in March.

That’s why I was so excited to read Carol Leifer’s "When You Lie About Your Age, The Terrorists Win." Her book is a collection of short chapters that amount to part autobiography, life lessons, and just plain funny writing from one of America’s top comedic talents. A former writer for Seinfeld and Saturday Night Live—and a powerful animal advocate—Carol has appeared on David Letterman more than 25 times, among her other television credits.

The book’s primary theme is, as its title suggests, devoted to the task of coming to grips with middle age, and the funny observations and stories that come along the way. Now that she’s hit 50, she’s free to express her life philosophies, like this, about collagen injections, “Your lips are not meant to be flotation devices for your face in case it capsizes.”

But the subtext for the entire book is changes in life that confront us, in one form or another. Carol was a lifelong heterosexual who fell in love with a woman, Lori, and suddenly found herself gay and delivering this bit of news to her Jewish father. Fortunately, he took it in stride. Carol says he had this reaction: “I’ll tell you when I was disappointed. When you married that shagitz! (For you non-Jews, a shagitz is the male version of your species).” And Carol was a person thoroughly indifferent to animals who turned into an animal rescuer (they have seven rescued dogs), a passionate animal advocate, and eventually a vegan—thanks initially to animal-loving insights of Lori.

It’s a fast read, since Carol herself hates hefty fat books with small typeface, and it will make you laugh throughout. And you’ll take away some great life lessons, including about the long and sometimes tortuous path many people travel before they settle in as committed animal advocates.

P.S. Carol will be speaking and signing books at the Taking Action for Animals conference in July, and I hope you will join us at the nation's major training conference on animal advocacy.