Being able to cope with a loved one’s death is never easy, if not almost impossible, especially if you’ve known them for a long time. Immediately following the cancer death of his wife, a man from Johannesburg became convinced of this. But the man would eventually have the surprise of a lifetime—the final gift his late wife gave him.

She expressed to her husband her dying request just before she passed away: she wished fervently for the plants in the bathroom to be cared for even after she was gone, so she asked him to pledge to water them every day.

The man took his wife’s final request extremely seriously, and for years he made sure the plants in the bathroom were always well maintained by watering them each day.

Only a few years later, the man surprised everyone by deciding to leave the home where he had lived with his wife.

The man did not want to part with the plants in the bathroom because they made him think of the love of his life and since he had promised her on her deathbed.

The man wanted to bundle them for safe transportation, but he had a surprising surprise.

In particular, he discovered that his wife had made a joke about the artificial flowers he tended every day.

This realization prompted him to cry, then laugh out, and he understood that his wife had intended to make him laugh and take his mind off the pain brought on by her passing.