Craigslist Has Super Powers...

About a year and a half ago, my husband and I were looking for someone to help watch our kids once in awhile.  I would look on Craigslist as part of our search and one day I saw an ad from someone who seemed like they might be a good fit.  And though Craigslist gets a bad rap, the person we interviewed soon became a regular part of our lives. 

I will call her only by her initial in case she doesn't want to be known.  K. has brought an interesting component to my life, though it is likely she doesn't even realize it (until she reads this post that is!).  Aside from our kids loving her, she and I have gotten to know each other over the past year and a half--usually by cramming in conversations when she arrives or before she leaves.  Many times, when we talk it feels like we are in a race trying to say all the things we want to say before the buisness of tending to the kids takes over.  It is one of those relationships where you never run out of things to talk about because you have so much in common. 

And that's the funny things about K. and I.  We met through something as anonymous as Craigslist, yet we are so much alike.  In fact, when she read the first couple posts for this blog, the next time I saw her she seem confounded that I had written things that she first took for being about her.  We have had funny moments of finding out we are reading the same book at the same time (this has happened more than once) or realizing that the shoes I just bought, look very similar to ones she already has.  Once we even bought the very same fabric at the fabric store to make a similar gift for my son.  We are both creative and love to constantly learn to make new things.  If you asked us both what a perfect afternoon would be, I would bet that we would give very similar answers.  It is a strange thing having so much in common with someone who just came suddenly into your life, who you see once a week, and who you pay to watch your kids. 

The more complicated part is that though she is nowhere close to being old enough to be my mom, she reminds me so much of her.  Not the parts of my mom that I wish could be different, but the amazing parts of her--the fun, empathic, adventure seeking, creative parts.  All of the things K. likes to do for fun are the same things my mom and I had our greatest memories doing together growing up--going to garage sales, flea markets, being out in nature, collecting weird stuff, taking spontaneous road trips, going to the zoo, and on and on.  Many of these things, K. does with her own teenage daughter and I find myself wishing that were me--wishing that I was the one who got to have this mom, who reminds me so much of my mom, without the darker parts.  But that's confusing right?  I mean, she is not my mom obviously and it is not that I really want her to be, I just wish that I could have the good of my mom without the hard stuff.  It makes me sad.  It makes me long for those moments my mom and I had when I was growing up that were pure joy and goodness.  I miss it so much. 

So with K. I always feel confused.   It seems like we should be friendship soul mates right?  But because my relationship with my mom is complicated, so is my internal relationship with K..  I know rationally that she is not the same as my mom but I still have this fear of getting too close to her, of being hurt by her, or maybe just being reminded too much of what I don't have.  I struggle with my feelings even though I know it makes little sense.  In the world of therapy, we call this phenomena transference.  Wikipedia defines transference as, "a phenomenon in psychoanalysis characterized by unconscious redirection of feelings from one person to another. One definition of transference is the inappropriate repetition in the present of a relationship that was important in a person's childhood."

So where does that leave the relationship between K. and I?   Are we friends? Employee/Employer?  Kindred spirits?  What happens when she is no longer watching my kids?  Do we just go back to our completely separate lives and that's that?  I really don't know.  It all seems very strange.  And all of this from a little ad on Craigslist.  Gotta love life--always keeping things interesting.