I asked my friend Chris for help with the bridge, which I wanted to be made of bent wood. His first question was, "Do you mean wood that we bend ourselves, or wood that grew in a bent shape?"

Immediately, I found the benefit of collaboration. I'd had in mind that we would get some straight wood and then bend it, it would never have occurred to me to find wood that had grown bent.

Many weeks passed and we hunted high and low for the branch bent just right, but to no avail. Until driving around town my love Monica spotted a pile of lovely cedar branches downtown where a tree had just been felled.

I tracked down the property owner, which was a big stretch for me in overcoming my shyness and eventually arrived with Chris to pick up our log on the same day as the tree guy was loading the whole pile. We found the perfect branch and Chris transformed it with his incredible artistry into our bridge.