Author Raymond Chandler’s wish to spend eternity alongside his beloved wife was fulfilled Monday after her remains were buried over his casket in a Valentine’s Day ceremony in San Diego. More than 100 literary fans watched Cissy Chandler’s ashes arrive at San Diego’s Mount Hope Cemetery in a caravan of 1920’s-era cars as a Dixieland band played “When the Saints Go Marching In.” (NPR) I was among the fans. It was one of the oddest, most eccentric groups of people I’ve ever been a part of, which of course thrilled me to no end. There were old men in three-piece pinstripe suits and fedoras with brims as sharp as knives and women in cat’s eye glasses and dresses with ruffled hems around their calves like seafoam. You could tell who were most of the writers there by their jeans and worn leather jackets and pale faces. I met a fantastic couple in period dress who drove up in a cherry red vintage convertible and in all honestly looked eerily similar to Ray and Cissy themselves. I was one of the youngest people there, although later a boy and girl with piercings and tattoos came by. It was a strange experience, honestly. I listened to an actor who once played Marlowe read through his favorite Chandler lines and passages with all the music and slyness those words require. I met the woman who wrote this book, which I just finishing re-reading before my trip. I listened to tributes and prayers and a jazz band that, by coincidence, included the daughter of a mystery collector who had been one of the very few people at the location fifty years earlier for Ray’s funeral. The whole affair had a sincere and yet playful attitude to it. Which, of course, was perfectly fitting. Do I feel better knowing Cissy’s ashes now rest with Ray’s casket? Yes, a little. Not for them, however. Just for us. Just for us and our conviction that the best in ourselves actually does matter and can even, sometimes, become reality. P.S. I wrote a whole, ridiculously long essay on Chandler at my main website. If you’re into that sort of thing. There are also a few more photos, including the aforementioned fantastic couple, over at Flickr.

Author Raymond Chandler’s wish to spend eternity alongside his beloved wife was fulfilled Monday after her remains were buried over his casket in a Valentine’s Day ceremony in San Diego.

More than 100 literary fans watched Cissy Chandler’s ashes arrive at San Diego’s Mount Hope Cemetery in a caravan of 1920’s-era cars as a Dixieland band played “When the Saints Go Marching In.” (NPR)

I was among the fans. It was one of the oddest, most eccentric groups of people I’ve ever been a part of, which of course thrilled me to no end. There were old men in three-piece pinstripe suits and fedoras with brims as sharp as knives and women in cat’s eye glasses and dresses with ruffled hems around their calves like seafoam. You could tell who were most of the writers there by their jeans and worn leather jackets and pale faces. I met a fantastic couple in period dress who drove up in a cherry red vintage convertible and in all honestly looked eerily similar to Ray and Cissy themselves. I was one of the youngest people there, although later a boy and girl with piercings and tattoos came by.

It was a strange experience, honestly. I listened to an actor who once played Marlowe read through his favorite Chandler lines and passages with all the music and slyness those words require. I met the woman who wrote this book, which I just finishing re-reading before my trip. I listened to tributes and prayers and a jazz band that, by coincidence, included the daughter of a mystery collector who had been one of the very few people at the location fifty years earlier for Ray’s funeral. The whole affair had a sincere and yet playful attitude to it. Which, of course, was perfectly fitting.

Do I feel better knowing Cissy’s ashes now rest with Ray’s casket? Yes, a little. Not for them, however. Just for us. Just for us and our conviction that the best in ourselves actually does matter and can even, sometimes, become reality.

P.S. I wrote a whole, ridiculously long essay on Chandler at my main website. If you’re into that sort of thing. There are also a few more photos, including the aforementioned fantastic couple, over at Flickr.