But what was floating alongside his boat wasn't driftwood-it was a sturdy oak limb. Back in his Eustis, Florida, workshop, Oscar turned the limb this way and that. "It wants to be a walking stick ...

But Marcus Barrick, a Duncan, B.C.-based musician and author, believed in the power of the stick he found while walking through the woods. "This thing's like the most majestic piece of driftwood I ...