Bridge Year Costa Rica – Spring 2026

Jimmy, a good friend I helped fix small computer issues during the year, would say that as he walked out the door. Every time he left to go somewhere, the same seven words. He was certainly a character; a stuntman, cowboy, actor, among many other things. It is hard to fit everything all into a concise description. He listened for 10% of the time and talked the other 90%, and always was able to get through his entire life story, culminating in a few laminated sheets of paper:

1). Making a Difference/Haciendo la Diferencia (in English and Spanish)

This he gave to just about everyone he met. It was 17 bullet points on how to climb the corporate ladder (he said he stole it from some company).

2). Photo Collage of him with various patients in a psychiatric hospital

He told stories of how volunteering at this hospital just off Central Park in New York changed his life.

3). A Map of Fiji

He spoke quite often about how, even at his old age (83), he was on his way to Fiji. He had land and planned to build a house to spend the rest of his life in.

Now, I hope the fact that he has these three pages laminated and in bulk in the back of his car, ready to give to whomever he deems “needs it”, goes to show how eccentric a person he is. He could only send voice messages because of dyslexia, which he struggled with throughout his life. All the voice messages he sent exceeded 15 minutes and usually went past 30 in response to me texting him something like: “Jimmy, how are you doing?” He always found himself in some

kind of trouble or a story he had to tell. Through these long voice messages, I learned quite a deal about this man and his life. He had two sons with two different women, neither of whom he was around for. Only later in his life did he get in contact with and meet them. He told me neither of them accepted that he was their father—something I can tell hurt him greatly in a strange way: one that he knew was deserved.

Jimmy was always running away from things, whether that be leaving his family behind in California to chase dreams of acting in New York, moving to Idaho to go live in the mountains with his horses, or finally going to Costa Rica to get away from everything he used to know. He was always chasing some new sort of fulfillment, leaving all the pieces of his life scattered behind without him. Now his new dream was to go to Fiji, and he was determined to make it happen.

I remember our goodbye quite clearly. He came into my internship site with his computer, and I remembered thinking, “Are you kidding me?”since I had finally sorted out what he promised was the last thing he needed. However, this time, he didn’t have a problem. Instead, he set his computer down and opened Facebook to a picture he had posted of him and me. He spoke highly of the photo, saying it was something of a museum piece. That our arms had lined up just perfectly in the frame in an almost geometric way. He spoke of how his account was getting all sorts of messages asking if I was his son. He felt proud, as if I really were. He told me he had just come in to say goodbye and to thank me for everything I had done for him this year. He said he was finally ready to go to Fiji thanks to me. As he walked out the door, the same words, “I’ll see you when… I see you.”

A month later, I got the news from my supervisor: “Jimmy died a week ago. They found his body in a hotel.” He had heard it from someone who heard it somewhere, although after asking the person forgot who had told them. We both were confused because how could you not

remember who told you that someone died? I checked my phone to see his WhatsApp status, and sure enough, it said he had been offline for a week, right around the date he was said to have died. I also noticed that there were two unopened messages left a day before he went offline. I listened to each, knowing this would very well be the last time I would ever hear from him.

He made it to a hotel in the back of a Mexican restaurant(?). He described it like solitary confinement. He was happy that he finally did not have to speak to anyone; he could just rest. He had mentioned a run-in with a gang and that some people wanted to kill him, “they don’t like Americans here,” he told me. He also spoke of how lucky I am that I have yet to see a doctor(?). The message and its contents were quite vague. One could assume he died in a gang fight, or that his health just finally gave out—after all, he did go from a diet of just eating (and I quote) “10 eggs and five avocados a day” to only eating bad hotel Mexican food.

Now, what I’d like to believe is this: He told me that, on the ground, approaching the hotel, he picked up a plane ticket—Quantas Air. It was the airline he had planned on using to get to Fiji. He originally thought he had to fly to California before taking that airline, but he became excited when he realized he might be able to fly directly from Costa Rica. So that is what I believe… that he made it to Rakiraki and is now building his house far in the north of Fiji. I am sure the view is beautiful. And finally, he is at peace.

Except… deep down while I’d like to believe that, I know it isn’t true. At the very least, it couldn’t be proven, but nor could his death. He refused to have a funeral and arranged for his body to be donated to science. However, I do know that, for the most part, the things I helped him fix on his computer were unnecessary. He wanted photos moved from one app to another, and his wallpaper extended with AI to fill the whole screen. I may have been right thinking that he was just making up new things that needed to be fixed. It wasn’t that his computer needed

to be sorted out before going to Fiji like he said. I don’t even think he needed to go to Fiji in the first place. I realize now, after all of this time, that he only ever needed to reconcile his past. And in a way, hanging out with me and giving me advice and laminated papers to help guide my way in the world, let him finish the last thing he had to do before passing: being a father.

And with that, those seven words still ring true, and will forever haunt me in ways I am not yet ready nor am able to understand. That is to say…

I’ll see you when I see you.