Selection Frustration

I think I may have asked something like this before but I still don’t get it. 

Here I am in edit mode trying to work from a reference image. What I want to be able to do is make my object slightly transparent so that I can select and edit verts while being able to see the reference. And not select verts that are not on the front of the object. Like solid mode while being able to see the ref. 

I keep having to switch back and forth from wireframe to solid so that I don’t inadvertently select verts that are not on the face of the object I’m trying to manipulate. 

There must be a way of doing this. Please let me know before I go bananas. Thanks