Even when someone lives a long, fulfilling life, it’s difficult to say goodbye when death comes. But it’s even harder to accept when the person you lose is your child, taken in the prime of their life.
Sadly, Raymond and Rachel Villasenor were forced to face this pain. Their son Joseph was a staff sergeant in the U.S. Air Force when he died in a car crash in South Carolina in 2010. He was only 36 years old.
According to CBS News, Joseph had served his country for 16 years.
One day in 2015, when his parents visited his grave, they noticed something unusual: the grass covering Joseph’s grave was lush and green, while all the surrounding graves were completely brown.
They were stunned and wondered if it was some kind of miracle.
Jake Reissig, 86, had recently lost his wife and was at the cemetery to leave flowers when he saw a young woman crying. He approached her to offer comfort, and she turned out to be Joseph’s sister. She told Jake about her brother, and that conversation sparked an idea.
“He thought, ‘How could I not better honor him than by watering his grass also?’” Jake’s son Roger said.
After leaving the cemetery that day, Jake made himself a promise.
Every day when he visited his wife’s grave, he watered her grass to keep it looking beautiful and alive — and he did the same for Joseph’s.
When Joseph’s parents, Rachel and Raymond, returned to the cemetery, they couldn’t understand why their son’s grave looked so green and well cared for.
But when they learned who was behind it, they were overwhelmed with emotion.
Rachel burst into tears when she saw Jake, and when he handed her the hose so she could water her son’s grave herself, she couldn’t hold back her feelings.
“She just stood there crying,” Roger said. “I think it was therapeutic for her.”
The Villasenor family was deeply moved that a stranger had taken it upon himself to care for their son’s resting place. But Roger explained that his father didn’t feel like a stranger to Joseph — because every day, he talked to him.
We need more people in the world like Jake.
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