Up Till Now: The Autobiography

to the animal acupuncturist twice a week. And for about an hour after each visit he would be fine, as if his pain had gone away. But it quickly came back and my dog died within the time frame predicted by the vet.
    Actually, there are several well-known animal psychics. A friend of mine once discovered one of them in a stable, standing directly in front of his horse. “Excuse me,” he said politely. “But you’re making this horse nervous.”
    “I’m sorry,” she said, “I talk to horses. Tell me, what kind of horse is this?”
    He smiled. “Ask the horse.”
    I’m passionate about horses and dogs. The presence of animals in my life has made a great difference. No matter what else was going on, they were always there for me and even in the worst circumstances provided great comfort.
    And eventually—and certainly unexpectedly—it was my horses that brought me the most surprising happiness of my life.

ELEVEN

    One of the most beautiful shows we did on Rescue 911 was the story of a young woman who had been killed in an auto accident. Although we rarely told stories in which people died, while this young person was on life support her parents had made the agonizing decision to donate her organs to several people. We invited those recipients whose lives she had changed forever to appear on the show.
    That was not the case when I sold my kidney stone on eBay. I was on the Boston Legal set in the fall of 2005 when I suddenly felt this incredible pain in my back and fainted. They were afraid it was a heart attack and rushed me to the hospital. As it turned out I was passing a kidney stone, which was only slightly more painful than taking a knife and sticking it into your side. Once it passes, it’s done, no aftereffects. The story got some minor coverage, people thought it was amusing. I thought it really hurt a lot.
    Soon afterward we got a call from an online casino who wanted to buy it. Because it is an offshore business this casino is not permitted to promote gambling in the United States, so they advertise their presence with stunts that will get the name of the casino in the newspapers. These were the same people who had bought a decade-old half-eaten grilled cheese sandwich with the image of the Virgin Mary on it for twenty-eight thousand dollars—and then sent it on a national tour. They were calling to ask if I would donate my kidney stone. Donate? Donate? Who gives away their kidney stone? What is its value, I asked. Is there a black market in kidney stones?
    The casino told me this donation would generate a tremendous amount of publicity. Right, publicity for them. Finally they offered to pay for it. I decided to donate whatever they paid to Habitat for Humanity. There was only one problem: I didn’t have my kidney stone. The last time I’d known where it was, was when I was in the hospital. At that point it had been right inside my kidney. I contacted the hospital. I would not be party to selling a fake kidney stone. The hospital was not certain they still had it. I was really hoping we weren’t going to have a legal battle over ownership; from what I have been able to determine the Supreme Court has never ruled on who owns a kidney stone after it has left someone’s body. It’s still very much unsettled law.
    On the other hand, I didn’t know exactly how the casino could determine if the kidney stone I gave them was the kidney stone in question—although when it was in my body it felt more like a kidney rock. We decided they probably could do a DNA test. But when the hospital claimed they found it, I believed them. Who lies abouta kidney stone? The casino offered fifteen thousand dollars. An insult, I felt, for a kidney stone of my quality. Didn’t they know where that kidney stone had been? And it also did not seem very much for the amount of publicity they could reasonably expect to gain from it.
    So I decided to determine its actual market value on eBay! One of a kind, I hope. I told all bidders, “If you subjected it to extreme heat it might turn out to be a diamond.”
    Finally the casino folded—raising its offer to seventy-five thousand dollars, which I accepted and donated.
    Some months after Nerine’s death it finally occurred to me that in all probability I would never be married again. That was very depressing. While I believed I would never again love someone as deeply as I had loved Nerine, I was just so lonely. So in my mind I began making a list of those things I wanted