when i was a kid, around the age of four or five, i would constantly tug at my dad’s ears. i remember my parents thinking how strange it was, this miniature, female version of my father, pulling at his earlobes in a playful and borderline ridiculous fashion. his skin felt soft between my fingers, squishy. i liked the way the bottom of his lobes connected to the top of his jawbone in a straight line, unlike my mother and other sisters whose earlobes scooped up to reveal a perfect “u” where their earrings shone embedded in skin, curved and sensitive. my father and i, ours connected sharply in the most uninteresting manner, a rigid lobe that was somehow less decorative, more masculine, more finite. i used to giggle when he tried to swat my hands away, telling me to go play with my sisters when all i was trying to do was play with him.

my mother was spared the ear-pulling. for her, i reserved my tiny nips and bites that would never break skin but would annoy her all the same. “you’re like a dog!” she’d tell me with a girlish giggle, as she brushed me aside to resume her cooking, reading, or folding. i would watch as the marks of my pebble-like teeth slowly vanished from her forearm, leaving behind patches of pink, near-invisible traces of my primitive love.

i liked the idea that i could be a dog. i’d often seen dogs playing in the park and was always fascinated by the fact that they could look as though they were trying to rip each other’s throats out without pause or hesitation, while establishing a sort of animalistic affection or bond. i used to tell my parents, “those dogs are fighting each other! someone should stop them!” to which they would reply, “that’s how dogs play.”

one day, i went so far as to lick my mom’s arm. we were watching a show together and i looked down and saw her smooth arm glowing in the dancing light of the television. “oh, my god! you really are a dog,” she told me laughingly, though sounding a little frightened. she wiped the traces of my saliva off her arm with a sleeve and went back to watching television. i didn’t feel embarrassed, but i knew i probably wouldn’t try it again.

sometimes i miss being able to tug on my dad’s ears or nibble on my mom’s arm. it all sounds so bestial, but those were the times when i felt the closest to my parents. as a kid, i felt that i had to resort to an animal closeness to my family: if i couldn’t touch them, feel the warmth of them near me, they weren’t really mine, they would just be… people. every now and then, i’ll steal a glance at my dad’s ear or my mom’s arm and just get the instinctual urge to reach out and touch them, to fill the gap of idle air and vacuous silence with the same warmth i felt when i was a child, their playful puppy.