The week after our return Sam called from Ometepe to thank me for teaching him to swim. It was an ironic thank you. I was a competitive swimmer in high school so I had taken Sam, starting at six months of age, to swimming classes at the YMCA. Sam delighted in the pool until the third class when the instructor suggested that we dunk our baby’s head under water briefly. I did. Sam started screaming as soon as he came up. He never liked the class again and, although he learned to swim, his head never went below the surface until he was six years old.

Now at age 21 Sam had rushed from shore to try to rescue a young child who had been swept far into Lake Nicaragua by a strong current. He found the going treacherous, made worse when the struggling boy tried to pull Sam under as he finally approached. Sam confided to me that during his swim back he had worried both that he would drown and that he could not manage to bring the youngster back. When they finally reached the shore, the youngster thanked Sam but two hours later the gratitude was forgotten. Perhaps that prompted Sam to call me.

Upon his return to the States four months later, Sam and I listened to the six tape set – the Power of Myth – which consisted of interviews of Joseph Campbell by Bill Moyers. In those tapes, Professor Campbell insists that people are happiest when they follow their "bliss" and saddest when "economic" forces take them in a different direction. Sam reveled in the spirituality, and the reflections about religion, contained in the tapes. His compulsion to wander seemed transformed into a heroic adventure. Later he asked me to read The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho, which celebrates the journey from Spain to Egypt of a young boy who follows what is described as his Personal Legend.

For our part upon our return, my wife and I, inspired by Sam and Jonathan Roise, wrote to a list of friends to seek contributions to continue the building of the new dormitories on Ometepe. Within several months we raised over $40,000. Some of the money went for operating expenses but it was enough that by the following July construction started again and one new dormitory should be occupied this Fall.