Kindred Spirits

I had lunch with a friend from London today:  it was the perfect antidote to the grey, gloomy weather that's pervaded New York of late, a lunch full of laughter and good conversation.  We were teasing one another about our respective OCD-like tendencies, when he brought up the subject of 'kindred spirits.'  It's been years since I've thought of the phrase, but it's been etched in my memory ever since reading Anne of Green Gables as a young child.  

It's impossible to describe what makes someone a kindred spirit.  The dictionary describes it as "a person who shares beliefs, attitudes, feelings, or features with another," but it's more than that.  Perhaps it's easiest to just say that you know one when you see one.  Still, on the eve of my third decade, I consider myself lucky to have so many kindred spirits in my life:

"Miss Barry was a kindred spirit, after all," Anne confided to Marilla. "You wouldn't think so to look at her, but she is. You don't find it right out at first, as in Matthew's case, but after a while you come to see it. Kindred spirits are not so scarce as I used to think. It's splendid to find out there are so many of them in the world."