My father was born and raised in Puerto Rico. He left as a young man and never returned to live there only to visit. He always wanted to be buried back in his hometown of Ponce. In 1984 my father's brother-in-law wanted to remove my grandmother (my father's beloved mother) from her grave in Ponce's Cementerio La Piedad to another grave within the same cemetery. She had died twelve years before. Now, I don't understand what the law in Puerto Rico is but the story is that after her casket was opened she was intact. There was no sign of decay on her. The men who dug her up said that since her body hadn't decomposed, they weren't going to move her (this is the part I don't understand - why they refused to move her since her body hadn't decayed). We found this strange that after such a long period of time her body remained intact. They put her back in her grave. About six months later, my father had his third heart attack two days before Thanksgiving. He died immediately. When I came home from college I was told that it was his wish to be buried with his mother back in Puerto Rico and we would be flying out the day after Thanksgiving to bury him. My mother reminded us that his mother was still in her grave, a grave she would now be sharing with her son. Remember that after twelve years her body hadn't decomposed and she couldn't be moved. My mother then said, "It's almost as if she knew and was waiting for him to join her."

Submitted From: New York, USA

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