“I had always loved music. I grew up listening to classic country, Waylon Jennings, Merle Haggard. My dad loved Vern Gosdin and Keith Whitley. So I kept going to class and started getting totally into playing guitar and teaching myself these songs.” CountrySongClassTeachingListeningGrewDadGrew UpGuitarMy DadClassicKeithPlaying GuitarHaggard Author:Jake Owen
“My mom grew up in Kansas, my dad in Indiana. They had boring childhoods.” ChildhoodGrewMomDadGrew UpMy DadBoringMy MomIndianaKansas Author:Hunter Parrish
“My eldest son, Jack, grew up with me as a 'part-time' dad.” SonGrewDadGrew UpPart TimeEldestEldest Son Author:Mike McGavick
“I grew up in a predominantly Caucasian neighborhood, but my mom is Filipino-Spanish and my dad is Irish.” GrewMomDadGrew UpMy DadMy MomNeighborhoodFilipinoCaucasian Author:Shay Mitchell
“My dad's Israeli. He was born in Baghdad to Iraqi Jews. Then, at age two, his parents wanted to move to their homeland and he grew up in Israel. I've been there twice, once as a baby and once when I was 15.” TwoAgeWantedMovingParentBornBabyGrewDadGrew UpMy DadJewIsraelIsraeliHomelandBaghdad Author:Elliott Yamin
“My dad left when I was a little boy and I grew up with my mother's family. There were foundations in the U.S. where Jewish people got together and sent money to Cuba, so we got some of that. We were a poor family, but I was always a happy kid.” PeopleLittlesKidsTogetherMotherLeftPoorBoysGrewDadGrew UpFoundationMy DadCubaLittle BoysPoor FamilyHappy Kid Author:William Levy
“I grew up in a broken home. My dad was out of the home when I was five years old. I never knew him very well.” YearsWellsHomeFiveBrokenGrewDadGrew UpMy DadFive YearsFive Year OldsBroken Homes Author:Thomas Kinkade
“I grew up watching my Dad, Uncles Ciaran Murray and Brendan Murray, and cousin, Aedin Murray, who were all national caliber Gaelic football players in Ireland. I try to watch as much Gaelic football as I can, it is my first love. I bleed Green, White, and Orange. Gaelic football players don’t get paid to play, you play to represent your county that is more important than earning money.” TryingFirstsI CanImportantPlayWhiteWatchesPlayerFootballGrewDadGrew UpPaidGreenMy DadIrelandFirst LoveEarningUnclesOrangeCousinCountyFootball PlayerCaliberEarning MoneyGaelic Author:Patrick Murray
“I grew up in Arkansas and that's the law. My dad was a high school basketball coach, so I was raised as a coach's son and I was a baseball player back in Arkansas, and I lived in Texas, too, so I was just surrounded by sports. So that's what I was going to do: Pitch for the St Louis Cardinals. I had no idea I was going to be an actor. So I got my collar bone broken in the Kansas City Royals training camp. And once I got hurt I started doing other things for a while.” IdeasSchoolLawActorsSportsHurtCitiesPlayerSonBrokenGrewDadBasketballGrew UpTrainingHigh SchoolBaseballRaisedMy DadBonesCoachesNo IdeaTexasCampsRoyalCollarsCardinalsBaseball PlayerKansasBasketball CoachArkansasKansas CityGot HurtTraining Camp Author:Billy Bob Thornton
“My dad's one of the funniest men in the world. I grew up with him making me laugh so much I'd beg him to stop.” MenWorldLaughingGrewDadGrew UpMy Dad Author:Rafe Spall
“I grew up in rural Arizona. My dad ran a general store. I grew up learning to do more with less. And I have been saying, you know, Washington needs to do the same.” GrewDadGrew UpMy DadStoresRanArizona Author:Ann Kirkpatrick
“I grew up in Birmingham, but my parents are originally from Barbados. My dad, Romeo, was a long-distance lorry driver, and my mother, Mayleen, worked in catering.” LongMotherParentGrewDadGrew UpDistanceMy DadDriversLong DistanceBirminghamBarbadosCateringLorry Author:David Harewood
“I was raised by my mom. My dad was always traveling, but she allowed me and encouraged me to be close to my dad. So I grew up with three parents: my mom, my dad and my stepmom. Ninety percent of the time I was with my mom, and 10 percent was with my dad.” ThreeParentGrewMomDadGrew UpPercentRaisedMy DadMy MomNinety Author:Brian J. White
“I do find violence entertaining, but that doesn't make me a bad person. I grew up watching all these action films when I was a kid. My dad would bring back 'Rambo' and whatever, and we'd watch it together. It's not affected me in any way other than I just appreciate the entertainment value of violence on film.” WayPersonsKidsActionTogetherFilmValuesWatchesViolenceGrewDadGrew UpAppreciateMy DadEntertainmentAffectedEntertainingAction FilmsRambo Author:Scott Adkins
“I'm from Houston. I think I was thirty-seven before I ever set foot in Dallas, and that was just in the airport. So I've never really been there. Dad grew up in Port Arthur, Texas and all I can ever get out of him is, "I wanted my first son to be named Dallas."” ThinkingFirstsI CanWantedFeetSonGrewDadGrew UpSevenThirtyTexasAirportsPortArthurDallasHouston Author:Dallas Roberts
“My dad was a city councilman and a county commissioner, so I grew up involved and engaged in the political process.” PoliticalProcessCitiesGrewDadInvolvedGrew UpMy DadEngagedCountyCommissioners Author:Bill Huizenga
“Music just runs in my family. My dad and my uncles are a gospel quartet, Latimore Brothers. They've been doing their thing ever since I was a kid, so I just kind of grew up around that.” KindRunningKidsBrotherGrewDadGrew UpMy FamilyMy DadUnclesQuartets Author:Jacob Latimore
“I grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio, and my parents are really right wingers. My dad watches, like, five or six hours of Fox News every day and stuff like that.” StuffParentHoursWatchesFiveGrewDadSixGrew UpNewsMy DadFoxesRight WingOhioFox NewsCincinnati Ohio Author:Jeffrey R. Immelt
“As an older dad who grew up in a rural culture in the South, certain things were expected of women, and that included raising the children. But I think its just as important for the father to give the baths, to hug, to change the diapers, to tell the stories.” ThinkingGivingChildrenImportantStoriesCertainCultureFatherGrewDadGrew UpSouthExpectedHugBathsDiapers Author:Clyde Edgerton
“Being a child that grew up with a single mom back in the 70s, Fathers Day to me was always a very uncomfortable time. At school, we would make Fathers Day cards for our dads, and I usually mailed one to my dad, and he hardly ever responded.” ChildrenSchoolFatherGrewMomDadGrew UpMy DadCardsUncomfortableFathers DaySingle MomFathers Day Card Author:Art Alexakis
“I grew up in northern California, where it was consistently in the hundreds in the summertime. My dad didn't think he should have to turn on the air conditioning when we had a swimming pool in our backyard; it was our built-in air conditioner.” ThinkingShouldTurnsAirGrewDadGrew UpBuiltShould HaveMy DadCaliforniaSwimmingPoolConsistentlyTurn-onConditioningBackyardsSummertimeSwimming PoolAir ConditioningNorthern CaliforniaAir Conditioner Author:Summer Sanders
“My dad was a particularly polite kind of guy, very courteous. So when we got on a bus, he would always encourage me and my younger brother to get up and offer our seat to an old lady. I grew up kind of liking that, thinking, y'know, that's a nice thing, that's a courtesy.” ThinkingKnowsKindGuyNiceBrotherGrewDadOffersGrew UpMy DadGet UpSeatsBusPoliteCourtesyNice ThingsOld LadyCourteousYounger Brother Author:Paul McCartney
“I grew up in suburban New York City and London, England, where my dad was working.” CitiesNew YorkGrewDadGrew UpEnglandMy DadLondonNew York City Author:J. C. Chandor
“When I grew up, people said, 'You'll never be the man your dad was.' And I said, 'Gee, I hope not.'” PeopleMenSaidHe ManGrewDadGrew UpYour Dad Author:Rip Torn
“From when I was born, my dad would dance with me in his arms, and I would watch my siblings dancing around in the living room. I just grew up with that. That was just my life.” BornRoomsWatchesArmsGrewDadGrew UpDancingMy DadSiblingLiving RoomMy Siblings Author:Julianne Hough
“I grew up watching science fiction with my dad. It was kind of our little secret. It was our bonding time as father and daughter.” KindLittlesFatherSecretFictionGrewDadGrew UpDaughterScience FictionMy DadBondingBonding Time Author:Katee Sackhoff
“I was the first person in my family born in the United States. My mom is from Croatia, and my dad is from Iran. They met at music school in Belgium. I grew up as a pianist.” FirstsPersonsStatesSchoolBornUnitedUnited StatesGrewMomDadMetsGrew UpMy FamilyMy DadMy MomIranFirst PersonPianistBelgiumCroatia Author:Ottessa Moshfegh
“I come from a musical family. Mom was a piano teacher for a large portion of her life, and Dad is a saxophone hobbyist who grew up in England during the heyday of Tubby Hayes and Ronnie Scott. I started taking piano lessons from my Mom, but it's too easy to slack off with your parent, so she passed me on to a friend of hers, where I got more motivated to play music by playing pop hits and TV themes. I did some classical training, but I was always more into the really thematic stuff.” PlayEasyStuffParentTeacherTvsGrewMomDadLessonsGrew UpTrainingEnglandMusicalMy MomPopsPianoThemeMotivatedPortionsSaxophonePiano LessonThematicHeydayPiano Teachers Author:Gerard Cox
“I felt like I already knew how to race by the time I was four. I was always at the race track with my dad. I watched him race thousands of laps in a sprint car standing on top of a trailer watching him, getting down and cleaning the mud off his car. That's just what I grew up doing.” FeltRaceFourCarGrewDadGrew UpStandingDown AndMy DadTrackMudCleaningLapTrailersSprintRace Track Author:Ricky Stenhouse, Jr.
“My dad was a non-denominational preacher, actually a Congregationalist which is really where all congregations come to congregate. That's why it's called a Congregationalist. Later on in life, he just became a non-denominational preacher, kind of a fire and brimstone type guy. That's how I grew up.” KindGuyFireGrewTypeDadGrew UpMy DadPreacherCongregation Author:Larry the Cable Guy
“My dad is a retired Shakespeare professor, my mother a retired classicist. Suffice to say I grew up in a house full of books, where reading was encouraged if not required.” IfsBookMotherReadingHouseGrewDadGrew UpMy DadProfessorsRetiredClassicists Author:Sarah Dessen
“I wasn't the athletic kid in my family. Both of my brothers were on athletic scholarships and my dad played semi-pro hockey. My younger brother played pro hockey. I was the music kid. But I always loved sports. I grew up around it.” KidsSportsBrotherGrewDadGrew UpMy FamilyMy DadMy BrotherHockeyAthleticScholarshipYounger BrotherAthletic Scholarships Author:Trevor McNevan
“I'm not a typical Republican. I am a Republican, I wear the Republican jersey, I've been a Republican my whole life. My dad was a Republican, which is interesting because he was in a union early on. The Republican party was very strong in the area that I grew up in. So I'm a loyalist.” WholeStrongInterestingPartyGrewDadRepublicanGrew UpAreasUnionsMy DadWhole LifeVery StrongTypicalRepublican PartyJerseyLoyalists Author:Anthony Scaramucci
“I grew up as an only child. I think it might just be that my dad really didn't care that I was a girl. "You're gonna do certain things 'cause I want you to, and that's the way it is."” ThinkingWayWantChildrenMightCareCertainGirlCausesGrewDadGrew UpMy DadI Want YouOnly Child Author:Mitchell Baker
“I grew up playing games, and I remember Christmas 1981 when my dad got us an Intellivision, and we all sat around and played 'Astrosmash' for hours on end. It was a big part of my youth.” EndsBigsRememberGamesHoursYouthGrewDadGrew UpMy DadSatPlaying Games Author:Roger Craig Smith
“My dad grew up basically in a hut in Taiwan without enough food to eat. And within one generation his son in America gets to do a comedy show about whatever he wants.” WantEnoughShowsAmericaComedyGenerationsSonGrewDadGrew UpMy DadHutsTaiwanComedy Shows Author:Aziz Ansari
“I grew up around poets and novelists and my dad wrote poems about everything - from a cat sleeping in a window to a car wreck he passed on the highway. I learned not to censor myself: that was one of things I learned in my apprenticeship, my creative-writing apprenticeship with my dad.” WritingSleepCreativeCarPoetGrewDadGrew UpCatWindowMy DadNovelistsHighwaysCreative WritingWrecksSleeping InApprenticeshipCar Wreck Author:Lucinda Williams
“I went back to a small town in Poland where my dad grew up. It was a very traumatic experience for me as a young man to know that my father's family were killed by Nazis, killed by Hitler. And that left, you know, if not intellectually, at least an emotional part of me which said, God, we have got to do everything we can to end this kind of horrific racism or anti-Semitism. And I have spent much of my life trying to fight that.” IfsKnowsMenTryingKindSaidEndsYoungFightingFatherLeftEmotionalGrewDadGrew UpRacismTownsMy DadYoung ManNaziSmall TownPolandAnti SemitismHorrificTraumatic Experiences Author:Bernie Sanders
“My brother and I grew up in a musical family. We have an older sister who sings and plays the piano. Our dad is a musician. Music was always a part of our lives.” PlayOur LivesBrotherGrewDadGrew UpMusicianMusicalPianoMy BrotherOlder Sister Author:Laura Allen
“I always thought of myself as a good old South Dakota boy who grew up here on the prairie. My dad was a Methodist minister. I went off to war. I have been married to the same woman forever. I'm what a normal, healthy, ideal American should be like.” ShouldHas BeensWarBoysForeverGrewDadHealthyNormalMarriedGrew UpIdealsSouthMy DadMinistersPrairieDakotaMethodistsSouth Dakota Author:George McGovern
“We grew up creating this whole world view for ourselves because it's not there in the culture. What am I? And I have to build this world view in the absence of books, radio and television, anything, even conversation, Mom or Dad or brother or sister or friends. I have to build a world view of who I am or I go stark, raving mad. Every transsexual in the past has had to do this.” WorldBookWholePastCultureViewsThis WorldTelevisionBrotherGrewMomDadConversationCreatingGrew UpMadRadioAbsenceWhole WorldWho I AmStarksWorld ViewTranssexuals Author:Kate Bornstein
“We all have rosy memories of a simpler, happy time- a time of homemade apple pie and gingham curtains, a time when Mom understood everything and Dad could fix anything. "Let's get those traditional family values back!" we murmur to each other. Meanwhile, in a simultaneous universe, everyone I know, and every celebrity I don't know, is coming out of the closet to talk about how miserable they are because they grew up in dysfunctional families.” KnowsValuesUniverseMemoriesGrewMomDadGrew UpUnderstoodTraditionalMiserableApplesComing OutPieClosetsCurtainsFamily ValuesDysfunctional FamilyRosyHomemadeSimultaneousApple PieHappy TimesTraditional FamilyComing Out Of The Closet Author:Cynthia Heimel
“Where I grew up, people obviously knew my dad because it's a small place and he was the top player for Swinton - they'd go and watch him play, see him in the papers, so they knew he was black.” PeoplePlayBlackWatchesPlayerGrewDadPaperGrew UpMy DadPapersSmall Places Author:Ryan Giggs
“I do love a bit of fashion. I grew up around a lot of it as my mum and dad had clothing stores so my mum was always designing a lot, and I definitely had that as an influence.” BitsInfluenceFashionDesignGrewDadGrew UpStoresClothingsMumMum And Dad Author:Leona Lewis
“I think I have a finely tuned sense of humor. I think just being around it and growing up in it... my dad and Mel Brooks and Norman Lear. These are the people I grew up around.” PeopleThinkingGrowing UpGrowingGrewDadGrew UpMy DadSense Of HumorJust BeingBrooksLear Author:Rob Reiner
“I grew up on the back of a motorcycle - my dad didn't have a car until I was a teenager. And then my closest friend from grade school was a guy.” SchoolGuyCarGrewDadGrew UpMy DadTeenagerGradesClosestMotorcycleGrades In SchoolClosest Friends Author:Aisha Tyler
“I grew up mostly in Champaign, Illinois. My dad was at the University of East Illinois, so I was always around the music. One of my dad's buddies was the avant-garde composer John Cage, so I picked up on that weird classical and eclectic music.” GrewDadGrew UpUniversityMy DadEastComposerCagesBuddyEclecticAvant GardeIllinois Author:Stuart Hamm
“I grew up as a little 4- and 5-year-old kid, watching Phil Tippett and my dad make monsters in our garage. That's what I did, as a child.” YearsChildrenLittlesKidsGrewDadGrew UpMy DadMonstersGarage Author:Robert Stromberg
“I grew up with a dad who hated television, so we had to sneak television. It got ingrained in my head to never follow a show that religiously.” ShowsTelevisionGrewDadGrew UpHatedSneak Author:Robert Knepper
“My dad was an immigrant kid and a Democrat and a Jew, and we didn't know any Republicans in our group. So I grew up Democratic. My dad was a labor lawyer - a very hardworking guy, a one-horse labor lawyer - and then I went to hippie college and lived in the bubble.” KnowsKidsGuyGroupsCollegeGrewDadRepublicanGrew UpLaborHorseDemocraticDemocratMy DadJewLawyerImmigrantsBubblesHippieHardworking Author:David Mamet