The woods can be a frightening place, dark and filled with the unknown.

For Sam Mejia, the woods are where he often found refuge from the streets, distancing himself from the sneers and stares that come when you're homeless.

Mejia's sanctuary was among the trees behind the University of Michigan Hospital - an escape from the world where he had no money, no job, and no sense of belonging.

That all changed because of soccer.

When Sara Silvennoinen walked into Ann Arbor's Robert J. Delonis Center looking for recruits last July, Sam Mejia, now 35, was just another face.

Silvennoinen - a case manager at Washtenaw County's Project Outreach Team - founded Michigan's only soccer program for the homeless. She discovered the idea while researching an upcoming trip to Finland, where a similar program was making remarkable strides among those living on the streets.

Silvennoinen would routinely walk into the Delonis Center offering those she found a chance to spend a couple of hours exercising and meeting others battling the hardships of being without a home.

Some, like Mejia, were found in a homeless shelter. Others were living tent communities under freeway overpasses. A select few had found housing and other services with help from PORT, but remained active with Ann Arbor's Street Soccer USA team.

So when Silvennoinen first met Mejia, she made her typical soccer sales pitch that focused on participation and not prime-time soccer skills.

At first, Mejia - who was raised on a Cherokee reservation in North Carolina -resisted, saying he didn't have time in the midst of trying to get on his feet in a strange city.

Mejia arrived in Michigan as a teenager in 1989 to help care for his great-grandmother in Tawas City. But after she passed away two years later and after his grandmother died in 1999, he found his way to Fowlerville, where friends offered him a place to stay.

But soon, their habitual drug use and destructive behavior became too much for Mejia to endure. Mejia, who says he has never struggled with drugs or alcohol, had left North Carolina as a way to get away from relatives who drank too much.

Now without a home, Mejia wandered into a Howell gas station, looking for a place to spend the night. The owner, unsure of the traveler's intentions, offered a back room for a night.

It was a feeling Mejia came to know well.

"I was afraid of what people would think or (wondered), are they going to take advantage of me?" Mejia said.

After two nights sleeping on cardboard in the back room and another few nights spent in nearby woods, Mejia wandered into Howell in search of a cup of coffee. A waitress had seen him walking along M-59 and inquired about his story.

She directed him to the local Salvation Army, which provided Mejia a place to sleep and some odd jobs. But Mejia had a bigger plan. He wanted to make enough money to travel back to North Carolina, where the people and terrain were more familiar.

He hitched a ride from a social worker to Ann Arbor, where he planned to find work until he had enough money to return home. Finding employment was difficult, as was finding a place to call home.

On the streets, people stared, believing Mejia to be dangerous. As a boy, Mejia's father had told his son to ignore what people thought. In a city where there are as many as 600 homeless citizens on any given night, according to PORT's calculations, Mejia chose to find solace in the woods.

Back in North Carolina, Mejia spent months at a time living off the land in the Appalachian Mountains. He dropped out of school when he was 11 or 12 and learned survival skills from his grandfather, who taught Mejia what roots he could eat in the wild and what animals he could trap.

So in Ann Arbor, spending nights at a time in the woods was easy, providing safety and keeping Mejia out of eyesight.

In time, Mejia found his way to the Delonis Center, which offered warmth and a square meal. Before long, he met Silvennoinen, who could offer more than just a chance to play soccer.

Like many of Silvennoinen's recruits, Mejia had only dabbled in soccer. Silvennoinen - along with co-coach Linda Bacigalupi - wasn't overly concerned about players' skill level. The weekly get-togethers were more about camaraderie and establishing relationships.

"(The players) are probably people you wouldn't see as friends or not the closest people you've ever met," said Silvennoinen, who played college soccer at Heidelburg University in Ohio. "But you see them together, and they know they can support each other."

On the field, players learn to work as a team, building skills and team chemistry with each practice. But each session also provides the chance to pass along news of other homeless friends - who's staying where, who's doing what and who managed to find work.

For Mejia, soccer offered a release for his pent-up frustration, stress and anger that came with struggling to find life's basic necessities. For those two hours, Mejia forgot about where he'd sleep that night or where money would come from or when his life would finally turn around.

It also provided something else.

"It just wasn't a team," Mejia said. "It was like family - everyone doing the same thing. It doesn't matter what situation you're in. It's about what your doing about it. And when you're on a team, you're just playing and having fun. You just forget about your situation.

"It's like magic. When you're out there having fun, it just releases you."

The more Mejia played, the more trusted those around him. Silvennoinen and Bacigalupi started to work on his behalf. They helped find him housing, a small upstairs downtown apartment he shares with two roommates.

But putting a roof over his head was only the beginning for Mejia.

A doctor who treated him for a rash Mejia had gotten in the woods and told him about the chance to finish his General Educational Development exam through a program at Washtenaw Community College.

During restless nights in the woods and in the shelter, Mejia constructed a better life in his head. The more he considered the possibilities, the brighter the future seemed.

Still, there were challenges.

"Sometimes, you just feel like, 'OK, for some reason, I'm here,'" Mejia said. "But it's time to move on. It's time to know inside of me who I really am. So I figured out who I am and what I can do for myself."

So he began to study, preparing for his GED exam last November. Volunteers from the University of Michigan answered questions and helped Mejia close memory lapses in basic school subjects. Once shy, Mejia constantly asked questions, better preparing himself for the exam. On test day, he did his part, passing on his first try.

Through officials at Washtenaw Community College, Mejia learned because of his Native American heritage, he was eligible for a government grant that would cover college tuition and room and board.

After one semester at WCC, Mejia posted grades good enough to earn him a transfer to Michigan, where this fall, he will take 17 credit hours majoring in mechanical engineering.

His tiny room in the upstairs apartment is his personal study hall. A full shelf on an aluminum book case is filled with text books. The desk that sits across from his single bed displays a laptop computer, calculators and more. Most of his possessions have been collected since he moved in, adding to the material belongings and souvenirs from home he once carried in a box when he lived on the streets.

Those who first found Mejia at the homeless shelter are amazed at the progress made in a year. Mejia says the people he has met here are the reason he never left Michigan, helping him find a new home here.

"It's exciting to see if you get your mind onto something, you can really accomplish it," Silvennoinen said. "Even with the odds against you. Sam's just an amazing person."

But even with his studies, Mejia still finds time to keep playing soccer.

Last weekend, Mejia accompanied his Ann Arbor teammates to the Street Soccer USA National Cup in Washington, D.C. The Ann Arbor PORT office raised a $1,700 through a benefit soccer game, pitting the homeless soccer team against members of the Washtenaw County Sheriff's Department. The event covered the costs of the team making the three-day trip to Washington.

National Cup games are played in a 4-on-4 format, bringing 16 homeless soccer teams together at one site. For Mejia, who has a distain for large cities in general, the experience was unforgettable.

During the event, though, Meija tore tendons in his knee. Unable to run, he moved to goalie. At the end of the weekend, Mejia, who also lost his glasses during the trip, was one of eight players selected to represent the United States at next month's Homeless World Cup in Milan, Italy.

Ann Arbor's team finished with a 3-5 record in the 3-day tournament.

His lower leg is now heavily wrapped. On days when he spends too much time on his feet, Mejia walks with a pronounced limp. Due to injuries that will keep him sidelined for two months, Mejia likely will not make the World Cup trip. Instead, he plans to remain in Ann Arbor, continuing his studies at Michigan while working two days a week at the homeless shelter where Silvennoinen met him.

Despite the disappointment of not competing in the World Cup, Meija will set his sights on making next year's national team, inspired by those around him and by lessons learned on the soccer field.

"When you first start playing, you say, 'Who's this, who's that,'" Mejia said. "But after you start playing, you see our hearts. Whether we win or we lose, it doesn't matter. Because everything was the same with those people. They shared what they had inside, and I see that.

"People come up (after the game) and give you a hug and tell you you're a great guy. It's like we met our emotions in that moment."

Jeff Arnold covers sports for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at 734-623-2554 or jeffarnold@annarbor.com