Preparing to travel to Indianapolis over the holidays to visit family, I wanted to see if there might be any live jazz shows while I was in town. There were; in fact, it just so happens that Indy has a larger, more active jazz scene than I would have guessed given its proximity to Chicago.

After checking several sites, I mentioned to my cousin, Carol, that I found a few shows that I’d like to take in this week, including two led by a musician named Rob Dixon. It turns out Rob is a friend and former neighbor to Carol, and had given sax lessons to Carol’s son, a talented high school musician.

Small world, eh? But wait, it gets better.

Carol and I were set to catch Rob’s show at the Jazz Kitchen in Indianapolis last night. I spent the day touring around the city, making certain to hit the incredible Kurt Vonnegut Museum and Library, as I try to do each time I’m in town. Within the small “Vonnegut and Jazz” exhibit were two displays for an album by local jazz guitarist Charlie Ballantine. The album was titled Vonnegut, all song titles reference Vonnegut stories or themes, and the cover features Vonnegut’s (in?)famous assh*le sketch along with the names of the musicians on the project, including Rob Dixon on sax.

Small world, eh? But wait…

At the Jazz Kitchen last night, well… wanna take a guess who Rob’s guitar player was?

It was a great evening, and I’ve already bought several albums by or including Rob and Charlie off Bandcamp. Additionally, I heard or learned of other local musicians and bands whose work I need to check out, including Derrick Gardner, Wes Montgomery, Ebony Rythym, Funk Campaign, Rusty Redenbacher, and Native Sun. I always appreciate being led to new music.

I love weird coincidences such as these, especially when I’m traveling. And really, the number and nature of such moments I’ve experienced over the course of my wandering the last six years has made me to start to view them as something more than mere happenstance.

The complex interweaving of seemingly unrelated threads — in this case, two family members, two independent musicians, a favorite author, a museum, a jazz club — make me believe that I was exactly where I was meant to be at the time and with the people I was supposed to be. To what, purpose, I’ve no idea: perhaps just recognizing and appreciating the moment is enough. As Kurt Vonnegut’s Uncle Alex used to say, “If this isn’t nice, I don’t know what is!”