We’ve sourced some of the most interesting and thought-provoking Dad Quotes from Eminem, Chief Joseph, Sean Penn, Sam Shepard, Seth Rollins. Each of the following quotes is overflowing with creativity, and knowledge.
My father? I never knew him. Never even seen a picture of him.
My father… had sharper eyes than the rest of our people.
Child-rearing is my main interest now. I’m a hands-on father.
My father had a real short fuse. He had a tough life – had to support his mother and brother at a very young age when his dad’s farm collapsed. You could see his suffering, his terrible suffering, living a life that was disappointing and looking for another one. My father was full of terrifying anger.
My biological dad was Armenian. My last name is Lopez, and I have a darker complexion, which throws people for a loop. My mother’s first husband is Mexican. That’s where I got Lopez.
I have never been a material girl. My father always told me never to love anything that cannot love you back.
My mom worked for Apple, and my dad owned his own business.
It was my father who taught me to value myself. He told me that I was uncommonly beautiful and that I was the most precious thing in his life.
I finally got the dad I always wanted and then he left. At 18, 19 years old, I was really upset and had to work through that.
Undeservedly you will atone for the sins of your fathers.
I was born and raised in Southall; we had two houses which we made into one big one because there were 12 of us living there: me and my bro, my parents, my grandparents, and my dad’s brother’s family.
My dad was a journalist. He was in Rwanda right after the genocide. In Berlin when the wall came down. He was always disappearing and coming back with amazing stories. So telling stories for a living made sense to me.
My dad’s method in his madness was to try every sport and then observe what I liked. I played football, tennis, golf, cricket but I loved my snooker.
My dad used to have an expression – ‘It is the lucky person who gets up in the morning, puts both feet on the floor, knows what they are about to do, and thinks it still matters.’
One time, when I was really young, my dad and brother were watching ‘Team America,’ the Trey Parker and Matt Stone movie. I walked in and they didn’t know I was there, but I got really freaked out by the marionettes – just the look of them, their mouths, those grins. That cemented in my brain.
Both my mom and dad were models.
My dad was the town drunk. Most of the time that’s not so bad; but New York City?
My dad is 20 years older than my mom. Growing up, I felt like he knew everything. I felt like, for every question I had, he had an answer.
I get on fine with my mum and dad, but if they want to see the grandchildren, they come to me.
I love my dad, and I’m proud to be his daughter.
My dad had me in Taekwondo when I was a kid, but I didn’t retain much of that.
Growing up in Luton, we’d always eat on a cloth, placed on the floor of the living room, with no TV allowed. There were no chairs back in Bangladesh and Dad wanted to keep the tradition, so we never owned a dining table.
Jim Carrey and my dad were best friends. He would always be in my house and stuff like that.
One of the regrettable things in my life is that my dad was not around to see my stardom, to see me wrestle or to see what I achieved by the dream I had at an early age, influenced by where he would like to go.
My mum, Jennie Buckman, was a north London Jew who, with my dad, proudly chose to raise me and my two brothers in Hackney.
My dad was very much a John Wayne kind of guy, but he was also a great guy, great sense of humor, a real dedicated dad. I don’t think he ever missed a hockey game I was in.
My parents were divorced when I was three, and both my father and mother moved back into the homes of their parents. I spent the school year with my mother, and the summers with my dad.
I did grow up in Los Angeles. I actually didn’t start acting until I was sixteen, so I was very removed from the Hollywood scene. I had always been in my school plays, but my mom and dad wanted to keep me out of the business until I was old enough to know who I was and not let anyone change me.
A fatherless boy raised in Jim Crow Texas, my dad was a tenacious autodidact, the first in his family to get a college degree.
I grew up upper-class. Private school. My dad had a Jaguar. We’re African-American, and we work together as a family, so people assume we’re like the Jacksons. But I didn’t have parents using me to get out of a bad situation.
You know, you learned that very young in American culture that the feminine boys don’t do well. And yet, I had a dad who was a lieutenant colonel in the army. My dad was a man’s man, but he still adored me. And somehow in the midst of that, I still grew up hating the sissy in me.
My dad is a good dad.
I went to many games with my dad, Kevin, and looked up to the players. It’s surreal that now young fans are looking up to me.
My father was grounded, a very meat-and-potatoes man. He was a baker.
There was nothing more I wanted to do than to see my dad react well to my music. I still do. I send him my demos all the time.
My dad is a big dreamer, so I got that from him. Golf was my main thing when I was a teenager, and that’s what I wanted to do.
Babies don’t need fathers, but mothers do. Someone who is taking care of a baby needs to be taken care of.
I’m from Connecticut. My Mom is an army brat, and my Dad is a navy brat. My childhood was fun. My parents are still together. My childhood was pretty carefree.
My father and I have a very good relationship. We always got along. But I always scold him.
My mom and dad are Republicans. At least two of my brothers are.
Music was in the air when I was growing up. My siblings Katy, Dave and Phil were musical; my dad worked in inner-city New York where a musical revolution was taking place – folk music, rock n’ roll, gospel music. My sister taught me to sing. My brothers taught me to play.
Two of my dramas, ‘Unforgotten’ and ‘River,’ were airing at the same time, and Dad had read about my ‘success’ in a newspaper – he thought it was brilliant. I was thinking, ‘Does this mean I’m going to be put in a box for a bit now?’
Atticus Finch. That’s who I want to be when I grow up. He’s the greatest guy ever – a good dad, a good lawyer, doing the right thing. And he knows he’s not supposed to win, but he’s doing it anyway.
My dad is a really funny guy, and we would make jokes about my leukemia. When my friends would come over, we would joke about it, too.
Being a father, being a friend, those are the things that make me feel successful.
My father loved people, children and pets.
My dad was a very unconventional Asian American man. He was very much not quiet, not shy, not passive. If he had to fart, he’d do it in the library. He did not care. He was like, ‘I don’t know these people. I’m uncomfortable, and I need to let it go.’
Sons have always a rebellious wish to be disillusioned by that which charmed their fathers.
My dad had a guitar that he gave me. I went to Walmart and bought a chord chart and hung it up in my room, and I was just trying to figure out how to play the guitar and put words with what I was learning.
I grew up with lacrosse in my life because my dad played lacrosse all throughout college, so I grew up with the gear in my house – like the sticks, the helmet.
My dad had two, sometimes three jobs. Besides running the Commodore Music Shop in Manhattan, he did jazz concerts, and he ran this great jazz label, Commodore.
My dad was the only son from his entire family to come to America, and I was his only son. We had come to the States to achieve security and success for our family. Rules were simple: No fun, no friends, no girls. Go to school, come home, and study.
I think my mom and dad both wanted to get across to me that… I obviously grew up with great privilege and was very lucky and was able to afford college and not have student loans, and they would pay for college, but beyond that, it would be up to me to make a living.
I got blessed from my mom. She’s the personality; she’s the one who smiled, so I took on part of her, and who also wanted to help and save the world. Then I took on part of my dad, who is tough.
My mum and dad got divorced when I was nine and my brother was seven, and all they strived to do was to make sure we weren’t affected.
My dad was so much fun growing up.
My mom and dad taught me nothing but ABCs.
When I used to do musical theatre, my dad refused to come backstage. He never wanted to see the props up close or the sets up close. He didn’t want to see the magic.
I wanted to be a forest ranger or a coal man. At a very early age, I knew I didn’t want to do what my dad did, which was work in an office.
Undeservedly you will atone for the sins of your fathers.
My dad always told me to stand up to bullies, and Bill O’Reilly is kind of a bully, and he’s the kind of kid who hits other kids on the playground. And when you hit him, he runs to the teacher and says, ‘Teacher, sue him.’
It’s something he used to say when he was happy. It could be a very, very simple day. We might be sitting out on the front lawn. Dad loved classical music and we might be listening to some Stravinsky or something and having some tea and eggs. And he’d say, ‘Oh, good stuff, isn’t it?’
The only big things I’ve purchased are my dad’s heart valve and a Rolls-Royce for my parents, for their anniversary. And that was only because my dad had a Lady Gaga license plate on our old car and it was making me crazy because he was getting followed everywhere, so I bought him a new car.
My dad is this typical orthodox, narrow-minded Punjabi man in front of whom you can’t even utter the word called ‘boyfriend.’
I didn’t grow up wealthy. We couldn’t even afford spaghetti sauce when I was first born, but my mom and dad worked really hard and came from the bottom up.
Dad was, is, and always will be one of the kindest, most generous, gentlest souls I’ve ever known, and while there are few things I know for certain right now, one of them is that not just my world but the entire world is forever a little darker, less colorful, and less full of laughter in his absence.
I’m from a single-parent family. My mom is like my mom and dad. She’s my world.
But the love of adventure was in father’s blood.
For me, it’s about moderation and discipline, and that’s something I picked up from my dad. I don’t believe in rigorous workouts but believe in eating right, going to bed early, and getting a proper workout.
My dad was a different bloke to me and not very nice to my mum, although I never judge him. If you did, you’d become one of those people who is all-consumed by a fault in their past. And I haven’t got the time for it.
I try to live my life like my father lives his. He always takes care of everyone else first. He won’t even start eating until he’s sure everyone else in the family has started eating. Another thing: My dad never judges me by whether I win or lose.
I’m an actor, paid to act. I don’t bring personal problems to the sets. Dad taught me that.
Every year since I was very small, my family – Mum, Dad, sister Charlie-Ann and brother Stephen – and I have been holidaying in Carvoeiro in the Algarve, so that has very fond memories for me.
You need your mom and dad to protect you. It means they love you so much.
There’s sometimes a weird benefit to having an alcoholic, violent father. He really motivated me in that I never wanted to be anything like him.
When I was a little girl, my dad always said to me that I was going to be this great businesswoman, that I was going to be the CEO of IBM. So that’s what I came into the world thinking, that I was going to go into the business world and make my mark there.
My dad is too cute. Every morning, he sends me one motivational quote. I have a folder full of all his quotes.
I didn’t really hear any other music other than what my dad was working on until I was 12. My recollection of hearing other music was that I liked some things that I heard but I always thought, ‘Where’s the rest of it?’ It didn’t have the same amount of detail or instrumentation or imagination in the arrangements.
My father was something of a rainbow-chaser.
My mother had very humble beginnings – to put it mildly. Her dad built their home out of timber that he cut down on their land. No heat, no air-conditioning – ‘no foolishness,’ as he would call it.
My dad died right after performing at the Friars’ roast for Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. I have that tape somewhere. There’s still a lot of good jokes in there. I mean, that was 1958.
My dad was very successful running midgets in Texas. Then, his two drivers ran into some bad luck. People started saying that Daddy had lost his touch. That it was the cars and not the drivers. I wanted to race just to prove all those people wrong.
We all started snowboarding in the beginning as a family just to be closer together, go on trips. It was our soccer, but instead of Dad yelling at me from the sideline he is there riding with me and hitting the jumps even before I am hitting them.
My dad saw it as a goal before I did, when I was 12 years old. I didn’t think competing in Olympics was possible until I was 16.
I lost my dad when I was younger, and I know what it’s like to lose a beloved parent.
I was born and brought up in Liverpool with my clever little sister Jemma, who is 14 and wants to be a vet. My mum Jane is an administrator and my dad Peter is a taxi driver.
My brother Bob doesn’t want to be in government – he promised Dad he’d go straight.
Dad was diagnosed with lung cancer when I was a lad. From then on, he lived in fear that death was just around the corner, and he set about programming me to work hard and bring in some cash.
Dad always said, ‘Get a degree and do something on your own before you start movies.’ He always kept me grounded, telling me the realities of the business and the struggles even the legends had to go through.
When I first started snowboarding, my dad pretty much dragged me into it. I wasn’t old enough to be like, ‘Oh, I wanna snowboard!’ you know?
When I was a freshman and sophomore, I got booed every time I was put in the game. Then, in my junior and senior years, my dad got booed every time he took me out.
Our dad was an iron worker, a really tough guy. He raised us to be strong and stand up for ourselves. Whatever we want, we go and get it. Sometimes, you have to take it.
My dad has sayings for days. ‘You bloom where you’re planted’ ties into farming, but it also sums up the ideals and morals that we have as a family by staying in Firebaugh.
Jeff Garlin is essentially my dad.
My dad encouraged us to fail. Growing up, he would ask us what we failed at that week. If we didn’t have something, he would be disappointed. It changed my mindset at an early age that failure is not the outcome, failure is not trying. Don’t be afraid to fail.
Don’t forget Mother’s Day. Or as they call it in Beverly Hills, Dad’s Third Wife Day.
That’s what Tupac and I got from my dad – the rebellion and the need to fight back and be recognized for being different.
My mum was the most wonderful cook and our house was always full of delicious food and interesting people. I remember dad entertaining the likes of Des O’Connor and Bruce Forsyth. But what really shaped my childhood were the amazing Jamaican dishes that mum produced so effortlessly.
I was very young, and I remember this heated, passionate argument and trying to figure out some place called Vietnam, something called a Watergate, and some guy named Gerald Ford who my dad knew who had just become president, and how all these things fit together.
Mum came to Crawley from Sri Lanka at 19 after marrying my dad. Later, Dad had financial problems and they split for a while.
When it comes to Father’s Day, I will remember my dad for both being there to nurture me and also for the times he gave me on my own to cultivate my own interests and to nurture my own spirit.
I always tell my dad he was training me to be a pro before he even knew it.
My parents couldn’t give me a whole lot of financial support, but they gave me good genes. My dad is a handsome son-of-a-gun, and my mom is beautiful. And I’ve definitely been the lucky recipient. So, thank you, Mom and Dad.
Thank God I have parents who’d support the crazy things I did. If my dad found a snake, I’d take it to the woods. I was always taking these homeless birds and homeless cats home.
My mom was Sicilian, my dad was Sicilian. Mom was a great cook, but all the women were.
But I have to be careful not to let the world dazzle me so much that I forget that I’m a husband and a father.
My dad is a doctor, a professor of psychiatry, and my mum is a psychotherapist.
I remember, when I was 7, my dad found a pregnant dog on the railroad track one day and brought her home. So my mom explained about how this dog was married but that her husband had passed away – she didn’t want me to even think that a dog could have babies without being married.
I remember opening my dad’s closet and there were, like, 40 suits, every color of the rainbow, plaid and winter and summer. He had two jewelry boxes full of watches and lighters and cuff links. And just… he was that guy. He was probably unfulfilled in his life in many ways.
My dad was a cop. My mom worked at various jobs – she worked as a homemaker, a bank teller, a bartender.
I always remember what my dad told me when I decided to turn into an actor. He was emphatic that whatever I do, I should get accepted by the audiences who watch my films.
What harsh judges fathers are to all young men!
Fereydun, that’s my dad’s name. My grandmother, my dad’s mom, when she was pregnant, she was dating a man from Persia, a Persian gentleman. It wasn’t his child, but he was still very supportive and said, ‘Hey, this is a great name,’ and so it stuck. So that’s what she named him.
My sensei was a British karate champion named Brian Fitkin. He was my mentor and because I had a hard relationship with my dad, he became a father figure to me.
You can’t be the dad who takes your kid out after your wife has said, ‘No ice cream,’ buys the ice cream, and says, ‘Don’t tell your mother.’ You teach the child to lie – and to disrespect the other parent.
I have never been jealous. Not even when my dad finished fifth grade a year before I did.
Looking back, I think I was always musical. My dad was very musical, and I think my mom was musical.
I liked that Garrett could be lighthearted and laugh about the future about being a dad and having the minivan.
I have great genes. Thank you to my mom and dad for that one.
My dad was a real working musician in the late ’70s and early ’80s. He had a band that was signed to Elektra/Asylum and they would perform at like Madame Wong’s and Whiskey A Go Go all the time.
My dad is just like everybody else’s dad. I see him as kind of a goofy guy with a great sense of humor. I try to get in a battle of wits with him, but he always gets me. I emulate him because I’ve never seen anyone work as hard as he does.
Where I come from, you don’t really talk about how much you’re earning. Those things are private. My dad never told my mum how much he was earning. I’m certainly not going to tell the world. I’m doing well.
I found my childhood scrapbook and there’s an interview in there with dad from 1970. He talks about how long he’s been playing the drums and he’d only been playing drums six years in 1970.
I would say the dumbest thing I have heard is that my dad isn’t my real dad.
I appreciate the sacrifices my dad made. I went to a great public high school.
My mom and dad, although they may not have had a lot of formal education, they were two of the most brilliant people that I know.
My dad was a professional basketball player, and my mom was a hell of a tennis player.
My dad always told me, ‘I don’t care what you do. Just aim to be the best at it. Even if it’s the world’s best window cleaner.’
I turned to my mom and said, ‘I’m going to be a martial arts movie star.’ She didn’t believe me, and neither did my dad. They both thought I would grow out of it. That it was a phase. I decided then I was going to do it or die trying.
Dad used to accompany me to the sets. Soon, he realized there is nothing to worry about and now I am on my own.
I love eating at my dad’s pub, the Queens Arms in Kilburn. It does a traditional Albanian spinach pie.
We travelled a lot, went on tour with my dad a lot. But there was never a moment when any of us didn’t feel loved, or taken care of.
I think, if I had a dad, I would have went the normal college route. I’m so stoked my life panned out how it was.
My dad was in a Beatles cover band. My mom wore Candies and belly buttons. The people in our family were very glamorous. They wore pearls like Jackie O.
My overwhelming memory of being a child is the huge amount of love I felt for my mum. She was my everything, because she was both my mum and my dad.
My dad was a proper old English gentleman, even though he was from the Caribbean. He used to stand up and salute during the Queen’s Christmas speech.
My dad made a film called ‘Willow’ when he was a young filmmaker, which screened at the Cannes film festival, and people were booing afterwards.
I’m a father. It isn’t just my life any more. I don’t want my kid finding bottles in the house or seeing his father completely smashed.
No matter how good you are, at some point your kids are gonna have to create their own independence and think that Mom and Dad aren’t cool, just to establish themselves. That’s what adolescence is about. They’re gonna go through that no matter what.
My father-in-law gets up at 5 o’clock in the morning and watches the Discovery Channel. I don’t know why there’s this big rush to do this.
It is easier for a father to have children than for children to have a real father.
One of the things I like about when I tour sometimes is that occasionally you’ll see a dad there with his 12-year-old son and they’re both enjoying it.
Every parent is at some time the father of the unreturned prodigal, with nothing to do but keep his house open to hope.
Ten years ago, I went to visit my dad in Australia. I walked to the edge of a cliff and looked over and tripped. I righted myself but my head was over the edge. No one saw it.
Dad taught me everything I know. Unfortunately, he didn’t teach me everything he knows.
After you’ve watched your dad beat the crap out of Charlie King or some other bad guy in about forty movies, you pretty much always said, ‘Yes, sir,’ and meant it.
My dad used to call me ‘the dreamer.’ He was right.
I stopped loving my father a long time ago. What remained was the slavery to a pattern.
I grew up middle class – my dad was a high school teacher; there were five kids in our family. We all shared a nine-hundred-square-foot home with one bathroom. That was exciting. And my wife is Irish Catholic and also very, very barely middle class.
I was a single dad in New York City, raising a child and pursuing a career.
I guess my name was gonna be Michael Vernon Wells, and I came out, and my dad saw my nose. He always says that my nose right now is the same size as it was when I was born. So he had to name me Vernon. He’s got a big schnozz on him, too.
My dad always said, ‘Champ, the measure of a man is not how often he is knocked down, but how quickly he gets up.’
The time not to become a father is eighteen years before a war.
My dad was a theater actor, so he had an agent, and he brought me into his agency when I was maybe four years old. That was how I started. I started modeling, and it progressed from there.
My dad makes me breakfast every morning; he’s very worried about my nutrition.
My Father had a profound influence on me. He was a lunatic.
Dad correctly said to me, ‘Gina, you’ll rue the day if I let you take your mother’s shares for the benefit of the children.’ He was right.
My dad taught me how to play tennis, and I owe that to him. But the better you get, the higher you climb, and the more lonely you get. I’ve had to sacrifice a lot of personal relationships, but that’s the choice I made.
I love my mom and dad.
Just because my dad is Clint Eastwood doesn’t mean I don’t have to work for a living.
Dad was very into electronics, robotics and computers, so I was interested in what he was doing.
I grew up surfing. My dad probably put me on a surfboard before I could walk.
My dad was an auto mechanic, but we moved to Fort Worth, where he worked in defense, building B-24s.
My dad always said, ‘Don’t worry what people think, because you can’t change it.’
I don’t know that I’ve ever looked at baseball like a purely casual fan. That’s just realistic when you grow up with it putting food on your table, and with it taking your dad out of town.
I hope I am remembered by my children as a good father.
My father was my teacher. But most importantly he was a great dad.
My dad grew up in Washington Heights. I grew up in New York in Manhattan. So we’re purebred New Yorkers.
Hello, friends.’ I’ve had fun with that expression to satisfy the cynics, but it comes from the heart, and I don’t apologize for it. Like my dad – for whom I designed the expression during the 2002 PGA Championship, when he was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease – I’ve never met a stranger.
My dad and my brother were more keen on football, but I used to play canvas-ball cricket while at school in Ranchi, and we would have cricket coaching camps in the summer vacations. That’s how I started.
My dad is a storyteller. I’ve heard his funny stories 500 times, but I would never stop him because he tells them so brilliantly and still knows where to put the funny bit.
My dad is a big Outlaw country guy – Johnny Cash, Johnny Horton, Waylon, Willie. He loves Elvis and turned me onto Elvis. He was always playing me stuff. He and I would sing and entertain the family. We’d have a little skit on Thanksgiving or whatever.
If my father had hugged me even once, I’d be an accountant right now.
My father was not a failure. After all, he was the father of a president of the United States.
One Christmas my father kept our tree up till March. He hated to see it go. I loved that.
Growing up, my dad owned a restaurant in Washington, DC, and food was something I was passionate about. But when I finally got into it, I felt like it was so late in the game; that’s why I worked seven days a week at Craft and Mercer Kitchen. I wanted to see how far I could take it.
I think the reason my relationship works so well with my dad is that we can separate our tennis lives from our personal lives.
I pressed my father’s hand and told him I would protect his grave with my life. My father smiled and passed away to the spirit land.
I inherited that calm from my father, who was a farmer. You sow, you wait for good or bad weather, you harvest, but working is something you always need to do.
When I was a teenager, my dad used to call me ‘Hollywood’ because I wore sunglasses all the time, even at night. Cue song.
My grandfather, along with Carnegie, was a pioneer in philanthropy, which my father then practiced on a very large scale.
A father is always making his baby into a little woman. And when she is a woman he turns her back again.
My dad’s name is Robert Stafford. His music name is R. L. Stafford; he makes gospel music.
Man, I love being a dad. It’s super fun.
When I swapped studying for a wage and a proper job, Mam and Dad were devastated. I was rejecting an opportunity they never had. But their eldest son, at 16, wanted only to follow his father down the pit. It was to be the biggest education of my life.
My dad’s a teacher and a football coach, and he found a job in New Jersey.
My father… had sharper eyes than the rest of our people.
My dad’s a Republican. My dad’s my mentor. When I was 18 or whatever it was and I decided to register to vote. My dad’s Republican, so that’s what I decided to register as.
My mum and dad are quite hippyish, so I’m pretty naive. I take everyone at face value.
No, I never thought about my father’s money as my money.
I trained classically for 11 years and then studied musical theater at AMDA New York. My dad is a singer-songwriter, so I followed in his footsteps.
If you ask my dad, I’m always the person that found the little bird out of the nest and is trying to put it back or take care of it.
Because my dad abused me, I was determined to never let a man tell me what to do. God clearly showed me that I needed to be a submissive wife if I wanted to be effective in ministry. The truth is, if we don’t learn to submit to authority, we won’t ever learn to submit to God.
I love the comic opportunities that come up in the context of a father-son relationship.
I hate being clean-shaven. My daughter gets very upset if I shave and says, ‘Bring back the spikes, Dad.’
My father was always telling himself no one was perfect, not even my mother.
My dad always associated information with liberation. He was very much in that Malcolm X tradition.
My dad says he likes to bask in my glow.
I’ve always been into music. My mom and dad used to always play music in the house.
Whoever does not have a good father should procure one.
My dad was always there, even though he wasn’t living in our house. He was always on the phone, always just a car ride away. Whenever he had a new recording, we would be the first to get the acetate. And it would say, in Dad’s handwriting, ‘Play it loud.’
Whoever does not have a good father should procure one.
It is much easier to become a father than to be one.
When I was about 12 years old back in Houston, my Dad used to take us to the driving range.
I’m not sure what the future holds but I do know that I’m going to be positive and not wake up feeling desperate. As my dad said ‘Nic, it is what it is, it’s not what it should have been, not what it could have been, it is what it is.’
My dad was not good at saying no. I’m trying to be better at saying no.
I wanted to take up music, so my father bought me a blunt instrument. He told me to knock myself out.
When I was growing up, my parents were almost involved in various volunteer things. My dad was head of Planned Parenthood. And it was very controversial to be involved with that.
It was my 16th birthday – my mom and dad gave me my Goya classical guitar that day. I sat down, wrote this song, and I just knew that that was the only thing I could ever really do – write songs and sing them to people.
I just went to your typical public schools, and my dad would take us to the movies every week, or he’d buy scalped tickets to San Antonio Spurs games. I remember I was four or five years old and my parents, who were very young, took us to see The Police in Austin, and Iggy Pop opened.
Jim Swan was my father, but Reg Barnes was my dad.
My father was never anti-anything in our house.
It is much easier to become a father than to be one.
Seeing my dad crying is the worst.
My greatest memories as a kid were playing sports with my dad and watching sports with my dad.
I was raised by a single dad. Dad’s idea of hanging out with your kid or day care was give her $20 in quarters, drop her at the arcade, and tell her not to talk to strangers.
My dad never told me that when he was serving in World War II he had gotten married at a young age.
I’m a fun father, but not a good father. The hard decisions always went to my wife.
My dad’s my best mate, and he always will be.
When my dad died, I developed a nervous habit. He was very shy and quiet, and I was like him.
One of the greatest titles in the world is parent, and one of the biggest blessings in the world is to have parents to call mom and dad.
I watch a lot of movies. I’ve watched movies since I was a kid. My dad brought me to the theater once a week. Always – it was a must. So I think that influenced me a lot to be an actor.
I’m sure there’s some awful video of me singing when I was, like, 13 or 15 at my old school that my dad didn’t take down off YouTube.
I didn’t come from a wealthy family. My dad told us if we wanted spending money, we had to earn it. So I developed an early work ethic.
I try to be a hard boiled sometimes. My kids see right through it. I’m acting. It’s always, ‘When I say you’ll be back at 11, that means 11, not 11.15. Do you hear me!?’ Then, ‘Yeah, Dad.’
Dad was the only adult male I ever trusted.
My dad gave me a haircut… and it wasn’t a very good one. When I went out of the house, my friends got on my case and said it looked like someone put a chili bowl over my head and cut around it.
My dad has blond hair, my grandmother has blue eyes. My daughter has blue eyes and blond hair. So it is pretty funny to me that I’m so heavily identified as an Asian person.
My dad was a longshoreman in the Port of Miami. Tough job. I worked down there in the summer once. One day. Never again. My dad was a no-nonsense guy. As a kid, I hated his rules, but as a man, I understand what he was teaching. He taught me you have to work hard for everything you get.
When my dad died, I had to go to therapy.
I have never been a material girl. My father always told me never to love anything that cannot love you back.
I hope I can be as good of a father to my son as my dad was to me.
My dad was a soul fan and a singer himself, and he loved vocal harmony, stuff like the Beach Boys and Motown like the Four Tops, which was a big influence on me.
I grew up in Shropshire, but I was born in Wales. There was a hospital seven miles away, but my dad drove 45 miles over the Welsh border so I could play rugby for Wales. But as a skinny asthmatic, I was only ever good at swimming.
My dad only ever talked about two things: bicycles and Mercedes.
I was born in India, and we came from a poor family and lived in a rural village. My dad came over to Canada as a refugee, and years later, we were able to join him.
Both my mom and dad were quite supportive. They never ever stopped me in realizing my dreams in the film industry.
My dad was raised Orthodox in Atlanta. He speaks Hebrew. He speaks Yiddish. He married a Jewish woman who is not Orthodox, so I was brought up by two different kinds of Jews.
My dad used to sing in a quartet. He loved everything: adult contemporary, anything smooth. He’d listen to the quartets.
No, I never thought about my father’s money as my money.
I’m a middle-aged dad, which means I have no social time or life to speak of, and so I connect with my buddies with my Xbox.
My father taught me that the only way you can make good at anything is to practice, and then practice some more.
I loved playing cricket from my childhood. My dad made me play in the streets, and my interest grew. He put me in a club, seeing this. My habit grew from that point.
My dad is one of my favorite human beings in the world. He’s just a good person, and he could entertain a brick wall.
My dad died when I was three so my mom had to raise four kids on her own, and I think there’s a part of me that pulls upon having watched my mom do that our whole lives. She had to make it work.
My father came from a very poor background, but I was very fortunate in the sense that we were never in need. My dad was determined to make sure that we didn’t want for things. He wanted to give us more opportunity than he had, a better shot at a better life.
My dad wouldn’t buy me tight pants. I had to get my own money to buy them.
My coaches were great. My mom and dad. My dad never missed a wrestling meet.
I learned as my dad’s kid that unless you physically can’t get there, unless you physically can’t do it, you need to show up for work.
No one was more important than my mom and dad. I know they are watching from a place up in heaven here today to make sure all their kids are doing good.
Humor is always based on a modicum of truth. Have you ever heard a joke about a father-in-law?
My humour is a mix of my parents’. I get the chatty, anecdotal stuff from my dad and the filth from my mam, Valerie. She has a very dark sense of humour, I think from having grown up with disabilities. It’s a coping mechanism. She had polio when she was eight and has been in a wheelchair for about 20 years.
When I was a kid, I used to imagine animals running under my bed. I told my dad, and he solved the problem quickly. He cut the legs off the bed.
I saw ‘The Exorcist’ at the cinema when I was quite young, maybe 14. When I went back home, my mum and dad weren’t in, so I had to wait for them on the main road. I were too scared to enter the house.
My dad taught me; Mr. Steven Seagal taught me, also.
I love the comic opportunities that come up in the context of a father-son relationship.
David and Dad didn’t get along too well growing up. I mean we all got along, but it was harder on David, because David wasn’t going to be the son that Dad wanted. But now they’re like best friends.
Being an only child, I didn’t have any other family but my mom and dad really, since the rest of my family lived quite far away from London.
In 1997, in Rich Dad, Poor Dad, I stated, ‘Your home is not an asset.’ Real estate agents sent me hate mail.
My mom was a practicing Hindu, and my dad was a Catholic who practiced yoga meditation and karma yoga. My earliest memories are of the bright colors, beautiful sounds, and fragrant aromas of both Christian and Hindu celebrations.
My dad used to DJ too, so we used to hear music all the time.
I’m a dad, I’m a husband, I’m an activist, I’m a writer and I’m just a student of the world.
When I was ten, I went to seven schools in one year in Nova Scotia. Me and my mum moved there so that I could be closer to my dad, who is an ice-truck driver, but it didn’t work out.
I was around computers from birth; we had one of the first Macs, which came out shortly before I was born, and my dad ran a company that wrote computer operating systems. I don’t think I have any particular technical skills; I just got a really large head start.
Once I was in a shopping centre with some Western Sydney Wanderers boys and this kid came up to me and said, ‘Hi I’m a Kuhlman, we have the same dad and my mum’s got photos of you as a baby.’ I was shocked, lost for words, really uncomfortable. I knew he’d had kids but no idea how many or age.
I forgive my mom for being a psycho and my dad for being a loser.
Everybody wanna be a super dad and the best dad ever, but sometimes, I’m just realizing that I’m not perfect.
My dad played junior college basketball, and he always showed me clips of Michael Jordan.
In my experience on ‘New York Undercover,’ where I played a dad, I was 26 years old, and I didn’t have kids then. And at that time, it would blow me away that people said they became a better parent because of watching my role on that TV show.
Dad needs to show an incredible amount of respect and humor and friendship toward his mate so the kids understand their parents are sexy, they’re fun, they do things together, they’re best friends. Kids learn by example. If I respect Mom, they’re going to respect Mom.
My brothers bullied me, so I cried a lot as a kid. It was the only defense I had. Telling them to stop wouldn’t work. The crying would bring my dad. Dad was my cavalry.
Watching your husband become a father is really sexy and wonderful.
My dad is a really honest, hardworking, straight guy.
There’d be days in high school where I thought I played well, my team got the win, and I’d go to the gym still in my uniform, and my dad would say, ‘C’mon, let’s go. We have more work to do.’
I feel lazy when I’m not working. I learned all my business sense from my dad. He always believed in me, and I think the last thing he said to me before he passed away was, ‘I know you’re gonna be OK. I’m not worried about you’.
The love for fitness is something I picked up from my dad, and I make it a point not to miss working out.
My dad has children by four different mothers.
On rare occasions, Dad used to reminisce about when he met Eisenhower and how Churchill would pop in, in the late hours of the evening or night, carrying a cigar, when he’d obviously had a good dinner.
One time, on Marine One, the president asked me my opinion. I had a flashback to being at the kitchen table with my dad. That dominant male figure set me up for being confident to express myself with precision and persuasion.
My dad was a coalman and was always playing snooker with his mates.
I’ve had some amazing people in my life. Look at my father – he came from a small fishing village of five hundred people and at six foot four with giant ears and a kind of very odd expression, thought he could be a movie star. So go figure, you know?
My dad was my role model; he always did the right thing.
My family loves movies. My dad and I used to eat a huge breakfast, and then we’d just go hang out at the theater all day together. We loved movies like ‘Indiana Jones’ and ‘James Bond.’ We were both big action-adventure movie fans. So I kind of grew up with an appreciation for film.
My brother’s a grip. My mom’s a scriptwriter. My dad’s a director. So it’s like, at heart, I’m a below-the-line girl.
A lot of my success, and a lot of who I am now, is because of my dad, and the way he raised me and taught me how to have a work ethic.
By high school, I was telling everyone, ‘Oh, I’m going to be a doctor when I grow up,’ because my dad was always saying to me, ‘Pick a career path where you’re always going to be necessary.’ But by junior year, I was president of choir, I was the lead in the school play, and I just loved being onstage performing.
I’m dying to be a great dad one day, whenever that day comes.
When the Happy Mondays started I was like the dad of the band.
As Daddy said, life is 95 percent anticipation.
The fundamental defect of fathers, in our competitive society, is that they want their children to be a credit to them.
I was raised in the greatest of homes… just a really great dad, and I miss him so much… he was a good man, a real simple man… Very faithful, always loved my mom, always provided for the kids, and just a lot of fun.
My father was an Episcopalian minister, and I’ve always been comforted by the power of prayer.
As I have told many, the only goal my dad had for me was to keep me alive to reach the age of reason! He had no aspirations for me vis-a-vis education, wealth, or anything else!
My dad taught me, like, no matter what, when I go out and play against these bigger players, just to be myself. I knew that I was good enough and that I had the ability to. I never shy away from anyone, and I don’t think anyone should.
When I was 12, my friend and I tried to sneak onto a plane from my hometown of Cleveland to New York City! My dad encouraged us – he was a wild guy, big on jokes.
My dad, he worked rebar, an ironworker. Watching my pops get up every single morning, going into work, working hard – I think that really made me want to work that hard, wanted to make me get up early and go for a run or get a lift in or get some extra hitting in and really try to better myself every day.
The amazing thing about being a dad is to be able to look at your child and realize that the universe is so much bigger than you.
I watched my mom and dad build everything that matters – a family, a home and a good name.
You have to respect your parents. They are giving you an at-bat. If you’re an entrepreneur and go into the family business, you want to grow fast. Patience is important. But respect the other party… My dad and I pulled it off because we really respect each other.
Employee fathers need to step up to the plate and put their family needs on the table.
Dad was the pitching coach, while Mom was the emotional supporter. Her unconditional love was great, and she wanted what was best for me. It was more about what she did than what she said, and she made sure I was the best I could be.
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.
When I was a child, I had wax in my ears. Dad didn’t take me to the doctor, he used me as a night light.
I explained to my kids at an early age: I’m a normal dad with an abnormal job.
Fathers in today’s modern families can be so many things.
My dad is a civil engineer, and my mom is a stay-at-home mom. The fact that my parents weren’t really involved in music was kind of good, because it meant that I had something that was private and personal.
My dad every now and then will toe that line and be like, You could try women!’ And I’m like Don’t. It’s almost an endearing kind of homophobia, if such a thing exists.
While my parents both worked full-time, we still grappled with the scourge of working-class poverty. But my entrepreneurial mother used her research skills to consult. And, along with my dad, she even ran a soul food restaurant for my great-aunt.
I have my dad’s shape. No booty.
I haven’t been baptised. My dad’s not in the church and is not a religious person. My mum is more spiritual – she does Thai-chi and goes to Stonehenge and things like that. I’m proud to be pagan. Finland is not really a religious country. I’m still looking for my god.
Because Dad was famous, I was so used to being identified as ‘John Huston’s daughter’ that I couldn’t think of myself as anyone else.
I couldn’t walk down any street in Britain without being laughed at. It was a nightmare. My children were devastated because their dad was a figure of ridicule.
I don’t know what it’s like to have a typical father figure. He’s not the dad who’s going to take me to the beach and go swimming, but he’s such a motivational person.
My mother told me Homer Ditto was not my father. Nope. Mom had had a fling with some other guy who was my dad. Some dude who didn’t stick around too long who Mom was happy to get rid of. She chose Homer, and Homer chose me, so he lent me his name even though I didn’t have his blood.
My mentor was Clara Ward of the famous Ward gospel singers of Philadelphia. And my dad was my coach. He coached me. And just my natural love for music is what drove me.
I was who I was in high school in accordance with the rules of conduct for a normal person, like obeying your mom and dad. Then I got out of high school and moved out of the house, and I just started, for lack of a better term, running free.
That’s all there was in our house: poetry and choir rehearsal and duets and so forth; I listened to Dad and Mother discuss things about poetry and delivery and voice and diction – I don’t think anyone could know how much it really means.
My dad constantly tells me I should calm down, but I feel so sad when I see places I’ve known since I was a child closing. I burst out crying when a local pharmacy closed the other day; it’s just going to become a shop that nobody has much of a need for. But I am trying to move with the times.
Our dad is not one to impart advice or gloat or reminisce about the good old days. But he’s a race car guy, been a car guy forever, and he always wants to talk about cars.
Feels good to try, but playing a father, I’m getting a little older. I see now that I’m taking it more serious and I do want that lifestyle.
The time not to become a father is eighteen years before a war.
My father? I never knew him. Never even seen a picture of him.
Father told me that if I ever met a lady in a dress like yours, I must look her straight in the eyes.
A little before my 10th birthday, I was like, ‘Can I please have a puppet, Mom and Dad?’ They were like, ‘No. You are a singer, not a ventriloquist. You have three brothers, and you’re in gymnastics. There’s no way we have time for this.’
When I’m singing, it’s a mixture of my innocence in the projects, my mom and dad. It’s all the good and the bad, the laughs and the frowns that I went through and seen other people go through. Then you be trying to write it. Whatever’s coming out, you try and make it all cool.
I grew up with my dad. He was very eccentric. I had zero supervision in New York. It’s kind of like I was an orphan.
I grew up watching my dad be a singer, so it’s something I’ve always been interested in.
When I was a child, I wanted to be a jockey. I love horses, but it’s not practical to have one in London. I also wanted to be an accountant, which isn’t glamorous at all, but my dad was one, and I quite liked maths.
The greatest benefit of depression is the fact that when I have talked about it, every so often someone comes up and says, ‘You saved my dad’s life.’
I think it’s easiest to teach by example. My dad didn’t tell us to work hard; we just saw how hard he worked. I know I have shortcomings – like a short fuse – but I’ve learned you can’t come home from a long day of work and snap at the kids.
My parents got divorced when I was around a year old. My dad was essentially a nonentity in my life until I got to be about 16 or so. My mom was a flight attendant for PanAm, so I moved all over the world. London, Rio de Janeiro.
My parents loved each other. I was raised in a house of total love and respect. My dad worked very hard and my mother was incredibly devoted to him. I can unequivocally, without any peradventure of doubt, tell you that I was raised with the kind of love that we only dream of.
It’s hard to always listen to your dad when you get older. You want to move on, but he has the knowledge. I think he did just the right amount of pushing me but also letting me do my thing, and just making sure that I always enjoyed the game, and I’m not feeling pressured.
My dad always made a big thing about having well-cut suits. It’s partly a cultural thing, but for him, looking sharp and presenting yourself well was very, very important.
Whenever I fail as a father or husband… a toy and a diamond always works.
I was built up from my dad more than anyone else.
My Mom and Dad always told me to not act on emotion, act on what is real. When you’re mad don’t do something wrong because you’re mad.
In the beginning, I was a stay-at-home dad. So I could actually focus on being a rapper. I could write. I could come up with ideas.
Both my parents worked at the Madam C.J. Walker Manufacturing Company, with my dad eventually being hired by another company called Summit Laboratories that made chemical hair straighteners.
I just wish I could understand my father.
I’m a father. It isn’t just my life any more. I don’t want my kid finding bottles in the house or seeing his father completely smashed.
My mum and dad ran a family cafe in Sligo for 35 years and worked long hours. We grew up in a very hard-working family and had a lovely atmosphere, as we lived above the restaurant. It definitely made me want to work hard, whatever I chose to do. As the baby of seven kids, I was definitely a bit spoilt.
From childhood, both my brother and I have had only one hero, and that’s our dad.
I grew up in an era where Dad worked, Mum looked after the family, and if I think of the qualities she brought to that – nurture and support are so valuable.
Listen to your mom and dad! They are almost always right, especially about boys.
I was 14 when I decided I wanted to start doing music and stuff. I was a really big fan of Ben Howard, and he put out a really amazing album in 2014, and then, after being inspired by my dad and Lady Gaga and Ed Sheeran, I wanted to start writing songs.
I always wanted to be a stand-up comedian, even as a kid. Me and my dad would watch ‘Evening at the Improv’ on A&E.
I was just a toddler when my dad died in a car crash. With my mum, Eunice, being a young widow with a large family, she really struggled money-wise.
The best thing about being a dad? Well, I think it’s just the thing that every man wants – to have a son and heir.
I know that I will never find my father in any other man who comes into my life, because it is a void in my life that can only be filled by him.
I’ve been dealing with racism since I was a little kid! My dad’s super black, from Puerto Rico. Then my mom’s super white – she’s Puerto Rican too, but she grew up in Milwaukee. As a Latino in the U.S. I’ve seen how we are treated differently based on the color of our skin.
I would never have done what I’d done if I’d considered my father as somebody I wanted to please.
What I respect about my dad is he comes forth, and he tells the truth, and he’s a very honorable person. I respect him a lot. He, I know deep down, has a good heart.
Everybody always wants to rebel against their parents’ music, but nobody listened to music louder than my dad.
I grew up listening to country music with my dad on the way to school.
My dad worked so hard. He slept in his own bed maybe half the nights of the year because of road assignments, but even when he was home, he was covering games. It put a lot of pressure on my mom. She brought in her parents to help out, and it took a village to raise us. I was lucky.
I know that I will never find my father in any other man who comes into my life, because it is a void in my life that can only be filled by him.
God is my psychologist. And my dad is probably the best sport psychologist in the world.
My mom and dad gave their kids the greatest gift of all – the gift of unconditional love. They cared deeply about who we would be, and much less about what we would do.
Everything that I’ve done in my life is always I wanted to be the best in everything I do. I want to be the best husband, the best dad, the best receiver.
I’m trying to create a collection of stories – the ‘U.F.O.W.A.V.E.’ songs are all stories. I haven’t really taken direct lyrical influence from other songwriters, but my dad bought me a book of W.H. Auden’s poems when I was younger, and the imagery really interested me.
A father is a man who expects his son to be as good a man as he meant to be.
I’m more comfortable with whatever’s wrong with me than my father was whenever he felt he failed or didn’t measure up to the standard he set.
There is too much fathering going on just now and there is no doubt about it fathers are depressing.
My father, he was like the rock, the guy you went to with every problem.
I hope I am remembered by my children as a good father.
It is impossible to please all the world and one’s father.
He described how, as a boy of 14, his dad had been down the mining pit, his uncle had been down the pit, his brother had been down the pit, and of course he would go down the pit.
Mickey Rourke’s character in ‘The Wrestler’ – that was my dad, that was my uncles, that was so many members of my family. It was the only thing they knew. And then they would end up wrestling for a hundred bucks, go to autograph signings for two hundred bucks.
A lot of people don’t realize this, but probably the one person that gets made fun of in ‘South Park’ more than anybody is my dad. Stan’s father, Randy – my dad’s name is Randy – that’s my drawing of my dad; that’s me doing my dad’s voice. That is just my dad. Even Stan’s last name, Marsh, was my dad’s stepfather’s name.
My dad taught me how to fish. When I am stand in a trout stream now, and I have the waders on, and I’ve got a fly rod in my hand, or I am fishing for bass, I think of sitting in a boat with my dad. How can that be a bad experience?
Whether I do an original film, a dance, or a remake of my dad’s hit songs, I have always been compared to him.
My mom listened to a lot of house music. My dad listened to a lot of roots and dub. I’ve got a lot of bass. It’s been in my whole life.
Mum and Dad used to do a lot of entertaining. We had quite a nice house, so everybody descended on us at Christmas – aunts and uncles, who weren’t even aunts and uncles.
Watching your husband become a father is really sexy and wonderful.
My dad loves it – being onstage – but I don’t.
Listening to my dad playing guitar along to ‘Sleepwalk’ by the Shadows was probably the first time I discovered emotion in music.
My dad was very intelligent, had a very strong personality. I was amazed with my father.
Big Mike Meyer was my real dad as far as I was concerned.
I was an only child, and I spent a lot of time alone. My dad was an only child, too, so we didn’t have a big family, and I was really close with both of my parents. Like any kid, I thought I knew more than they did.
I want to be a dad, first and foremost. I want to be a good father. I’ve spent so much of my life on the move and travelling around the world that just to set up a home for my family and be a good dad is something that motivates me.
My dad is the first to say that Mum deals with the mortgage payments, the bills, the rota, things like that, while my dad is the emotional one who keeps the home together. He’s the nurturer, but together, they work perfectly.
My mom keeps me going, man. She deserves such a good life. I just wanna give it to her. My dad, too. My family, my friends, they keep me motivated. Just knowing my personal legend, just knowing what I’m supposed to do, that keeps me going.
I can definitely say the older I’ve got the better I’ve become at being a dad and a husband.
My dad was a produce man. He worked in grocery stores for 35 years. My mom just babysat kids and raised us. I have four sisters and one brother. I’m the baby.
When a father, absent during the day, returns home at six, his children receive only his temperament, not his teaching.
When one has not had a good father, one must create one.
Neither my mom nor my dad ever bought me any comic books. Certainly not for Christmas. I suspect that doing so would have violated the Parents’ Code.
At the end of the day, I’m very lucky to have what I have and do what I do, but I don’t see myself as any different from anyone else who works hard and is a dad and a husband.
My dad didn’t believe that I was going to make it through school, and that was the only thing I was determined to do, because he said that I wasn’t going to do it.
Even when I was 3 or 4 years old, I’d go out riding in the car with mom and dad, and I already knew all the songs off mom’s Hank Williams and George Jones records by heart. I remember just sitting in the back seat and singing them at the top of my lungs.
I’m a dad, and I can tell you it’s the most beautiful thing in the world.
My mother taught me what it is to have a sense of humour; my dad, who was a headmaster, everything you need to know about hard work. My dad is the most decent man you could come across.
My dad’s a football coach, that’s what he does.
My mum and dad used to make me stand up at dinner parties and sing to their friends.
To get the Red Bull junior drive was like a massive pressure off… I didn’t have to go around asking Mum and Dad to sell their house or ask friends for funding. The instant feeling was, ‘Oh wow, amazing.’
Dad was a baker, and we lived above the bakery, so I was always popping down to have an apple pie or a doughnut or a custard or gypsy tart: I had a very sweet tooth, and I think that that was what got me into doing what I do now.
I gotta be honest with you. I’m kind of jealous of the way my dad gets to talk to my mom sometimes. Where are all those old-school women you can just take your day out on? When did they stop making those angels?
The best money advice ever given me was from my father. When I was a little girl, he told me, ‘Don’t spend anything unless you have to.’
My father was never anti-anything in our house.
Every morning, my dad would have me looking in the mirror and repeat, ‘Today is going to be a great day; I can, and I will.’
I’m lucky because I remember my dad showing me ‘Independence Day,’ and I loved it.
My kids gotta understand: they gotta make a sacrifice, having a superstar dad.
I just wish I could understand my father.
My dad is this very sensible guy who never let me feel that anything was beyond my station.
My father never raised his hand to any one of his children, except in self-defense.
The most ironic thing is my grandfather has his masters in music composition; he was a jazz composer. My dad was a musician, too. He played more, like, soul music.
Mom and Dad would stay in bed on Sunday morning, but the kids would have to go to church.
Unfortunately, I never saw Pele play. What I know of him is through my grandfather, my dad’s dad, who used to talk to me and tell me about how he played.
I grew up – my dad, every time I was with my dad, he was always – not always, but he wrote. He’s a writer. So he was always in his office writing. He made a plan and, like, a point of, ‘This is my work. I’m going to do this every day for these amount of hours.’ So I think that’s where I got, like, a work sort of ethic.
As Daddy said, life is 95 percent anticipation.
My mother and dad were big animal lovers, too. I just don’t know how I would have lived without animals around me. I’m fascinated by them – both domestic pets and the wild community. They just are the most interesting things in the world to me, and it’s made such a difference in my lifetime.
I was always the new kid in school, I’m the kid from a broken family, I’m the kid who had no dad showing up at the father-son stuff, I’m the kid that was using food stamps at the grocery store.
When I was fifteen years old, my dad won a video camera in a corporate golf tournament. I snatched it from his closet and began filming skateboard videos with my friends.
I kept my babies fed. I could have dumped them, but I didn’t. I decided that whatever trip I was on, they were going with me. You’re looking at a real daddy.
Mom was so funny and loving to us kids. She was our first audience. When my dad died, I was suddenly alone in the house with her because my two older brothers were away at college. I was the man of the house, and she was the grieving woman.
My dad got me the same mic I use on everything now – this $200 mic from Guitar Center.
Prostate cancer has taken a lot from me. First it took my grandfather and then my dad.
Dad used to reminisce about the good old days when Everton won the old first division championship and the FA Cup back in the 1970s and 80s but they weren’t quite so good when I started supporting them.
I think the most fun part about working on ‘Good Luck Charlie’ is spending time with everyone, honestly, because everybody on set is like my brother and sister and mom and dad. They’re so fun to be around, so that’s probably the best part about working there.
My dad was my coach in baseball and early on in basketball, so playing baseball was something we always did.
Nothing had been attempted like that, to lift Dad’s voice, literally, off of that track and put it on a brand-new one, and then line it up, match it up, get the phrasing right. I remember listening – everyone listening at the end, and we were just enthralled. It was really wonderful.
My dad’s a beautiful man, but like a lot of Mexican men, or men in general, a lot of men have a problem with the balance of masculinity and femininity – intuition and compassion and tenderness – and get overboard with the macho thing. It took him a while to become more, I would say, conscious, evolved.
I was a pitcher, and my dad played in college. The hardest day of my life was telling him I was going to quit to focus more on golf. But with golf, I felt like the game can’t be perfected, and that motivated me.
My parents have been volleyball players, and my dad is an Arjuna awardee in volleyball.
I think I can always look back and say my mom and dad would have done this or suggested that in a particular situation. I just really feel blessed to have had them as parents.
My dad gave me this advice: ‘Make what you want to do for the rest of your life the first thing you do in the day and then worry about hanging out with friends.’
In my heart, I’m just a kid from the council houses. I can remember the old cottage and my dad coming round with the tin bath. I’m not a rich man.
I’m a junior, so my dad’s name is Thomas Rhett Akins as well. So literally, from the day I was born, it was Thomas Rhett. It wasn’t Thomas or Rhett, it was Thomas Rhett.
Be there for my dad, like he was for me.
Being a pastor’s kid comes with a lot of pressure and scrutiny. A lot of my dad’s sermons were about respect. It was a beautiful way to be taught about love and two people being equal.
OK, I have a nickname. My family calls me ‘Trey’ because I’m William the third. My dad has the same name, which is always confusing because my dad is well known, and I’m also known.
I have a mug that actually verifies that I’m the world’s best dad. That’s a mug. That’s not me talking. You can’t just buy those.
My mom is from Venezuela, and my dad is German and Japanese, and we lived in Brazil when I was a kid for a couple of years, and then I grew up on Long Island. I think all the traveling and all the nationalities put that stuff in my head. I was just around it a lot.
Here’s what happens in a play. You get involved in a situation where something is unbalanced. If nothing’s unbalanced, there’s no reason to have a play. If Hamlet comes home from school, and his dad’s not dead and asks him if he’s had a good time, it’s boring. But if something’s unbalanced, it must be returned to order.
My father and I have a very good relationship. We always got along. But I always scold him.
I always wanted what Mom and Dad had.
One of my earliest memories is of my father carrying me in one arm with a picket sign in the other.
I was born in Canada, and then my dad played pro soccer in England and then also on an island off the coast of Portugal. So we lived there for, like, 10 years. And then we moved to Minnesota. So I feel like I’ve experienced a lot of different cultures, and I’m still figuring out who I am.
I was born in Orange County – in Santa Ana. My dad is from California. I was raised on the East Coast. My first two years were in California, but I claim East Coast. I’m sorry, I don’t rep California.
I inherited that calm from my father, who was a farmer. You sow, you wait for good or bad weather, you harvest, but working is something you always need to do.
My dad was this Jack-of-all-trades, entrepreneur type. I secretly think he may be a spy, when I really think about it and I kind of connect the pieces. That’s what led us to moving to Japan when I was four.
My dad was a Punjabi from Amritsar, and my mom is a Punjabi from Kashmir. My dad was a soldier in the Indian Army.
My dad was my best friend and greatest role model. He was an amazing dad, coach, mentor, soldier, husband and friend.
Our dad was a great guy and we will never forget him.
A mustache really defines your face. My dad had a mustache when I was growing up, and I can still remember when he shaved it, he looked like a completely different person.
I grew up on a working farm. It was small, a hundred acres, but we had cows and pigs and chickens and sheep and a vegetable garden. I spent hours pulling weeds, hoeing, feeding the horses, cleaning out the stalls. My dad was a tough taskmaster. I always worked, but we also had fun.
I was obsessed with the Turtles, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. There’s Leonardo, Donatello, Michelangelo, Raphael and my dad used to call me Callemundo, saying you’re the fifth turtle.
My dad is a preacher. Growing up, I went to church every time the doors were open.
When I was 14, in Cuba, I met Fidel Castro with my dad, and it was really impressive. And on a totally different level, I met Justin Timberlake!
I am very happy to say I look just like my dad. But mothers always think their children are prettier than they really are, and mine has always told me I look like Tom Cruise.
My British mum met my American dad when she was on holiday in the United States when she was 19. She kinda never looked back. I was born in the United States, raised in Montana and London.
My dad was a plumber. That’s hard work. He never missed a day of work. I will never disrespect him by not showing up for an athletic competition that has a maximum duration of 25 minutes. There should be forfeiture if you have to pull out of a fight. If you don’t show up, it should be a loss on your record.
I grew up not liking my father very much. I never saw him cry. But he must have. Everybody cries.
The beauty of where I’m from – this small little town called Wallburg, North Carolina – I didn’t have a TV; I was out playing ball with my dad, shooting clay pigeons.
I love Vegemite sandwiches, Milo, ham sandwiches, chicken breasts, and that’s all I used to eat. I wouldn’t eat anything else. So at home there was always two sets of dinner, one for Mum and Dad and one for me, because I was so fussy.
Music’s been with me from the get-go. It was always around me as a kid. Dad got me my first guitar when I was 11 and, at school, if you wanted to be cool you had to be in a band.
The most important lesson my dad taught me was how to manage fear. Early on, he taught me that in a time of emergency, you’ve got to become deliberately calm.
My dad is a singer. He used to sing in nightclubs, or pizza joints.
Wear what you want to wear. Do what you want to do. Be who you are. Pick out your own clothes. Be a man. And if that’s too much to ask, as it almost always is for me, think of someone you consider to be a man and pretend to be like him. I pretend to be like my dad.
Of course my dad went to Formula One, so I think that my dad is the better driver of the two. But I think, for a girl, my mom was not too bad, of course.
My dad has given me the best gift anyone has ever given me. He gave me wings to fly.
By the time we woke up on Sundays, my dad would have left home to get mutton. It was a kind of stew with thick gravy that my mother used to make in a pressure cooker. Even after the mutton was over, the cooker would still have some masala left. I used to polish it off with some rice.
I stopped loving my father a long time ago. What remained was the slavery to a pattern.
I learned from my dad’s mistakes. I think that’s why I’m so into my son. I bring him lunch every day: McDonald’s, Taco Bell, whatever junk food a kid likes, I will bring it for him. I’ve canceled gigs so I could be at moments for him. That wasn’t a big thing for my dad.
In 2009, I fractured my skull in a freak accident at an L.A. restaurant. I suffered a seizure and was rushed into hospital. I was so out of it that I refused to let them scan my brain. My dad rushed to my bedside and talked me into having the CAT scan – he told me that I might die if I didn’t go through with it.
I was a mixture of being incredibly old for my age and incredibly backwards. I was born quite old, but then I stopped growing. I lived with my mum and dad till I was 30.
I have always thought of Walt Disney as my second father.
Thirteen, 13 children, and I love – I love them all. And I think I’ve been a good father to all of them.
I come from an ordinary family – my dad is a carpenter, a roof-maker – and we’ve always loved racing together.
I’m half Telugu. My mom is Telugu and dad, a Maharashtrian. I was brought up in Gwalior. I was exposed to English, Hindi, and Marathi. I heard my mom speak to her family in Telugu, so I got the hang of it.
First and foremost, it’s my mom and dad who gave me the foundation, the belief in me that I could do anything.
So my father was a person who never lied to me. If I had a question, he answered it. I knew a lot of things at a young age because I was intrigued.
My dad treated Marilyn Monroe more like his daughter than me.
My dad was in the army. World War II. He got his college education from the army. After World War II he became an insurance salesman. Really, I didn’t know my dad very well. He and my mother split up after the war. I was raised by my maternal grandmother and grandfather, and by my mother.
My dad makes me hiss with laughter.
My dad used to say, ‘You wouldn’t worry so much about what people thought about you if you knew how seldom they did.
With my mom and dad around, I became a child yet again.
After my parents’ divorce when I was 4, I spent weekends with my dad before we finally moved to California. By the time Sunday rolled around, I was incapable of enjoying the day’s activities, of being in the moment, because I was already dreading the inevitable goodbye of Sunday evening.
Oh, the first dish I learned to make, I think I was about 10 years old, I made my dad spaghetti and broccoli for dinner when he got home from work, and it was, like, a surprise.
The whole thought of being a dad was scary to me.
My dad brought me up to respect people but if you have your opinion and feel you’re in the right, not to be afraid to say it.
I started off with sim driving, playing ‘Gran Turismo,’ and my Dad had some sort of Logitech steering wheel with pedals for the PlayStation 2.
Did Superman really want to save the world, or did he just feel like he had to? Would he much rather be a farmer? Maybe. Would he much rather be hanging out with his dad and his mom and his dog? Probably.
I’ve told Billy if I ever caught him cheating, I wouldn’t kill him because I love his children and they need a dad. But I would beat him up. I know where all of his sports injuries are.
My dad farmed, my granddad was a farmer. I wanted to be a farmer.
My mum was raised Jewish, my dad is very scientifically minded, and my school was vaguely Christian. We sang hymns in school. I liked the hymns bit, but apart from that, I can take it or leave it. So I had lots of different influences when I was younger.
Dad, wherever you are, you are gone but you will never be forgotten.
I was born Gaynor Hopkins, one of seven children. My mum, Elsie, and dad, Glyndwr, always said they had seven children, although my sister Paulene was stillborn.
My father – until the day that my dad died – didn’t know how many points you scored in a touchdown. He could say there were nine innings in baseball, but no intricacies of the sport.
You realise that there’s nothing more endearing than people who are desperately trying to be liked or trying to be the hero, you know? Who also probably just need a hug or want to impress their dad?
My dad was a diplomat and after living in America, where I was born, he was posted to Cairo.
My stepdad I always used to think was my real dad and even to this day I still do. He’s been unbelievable, I love him like a real dad.
I was skint, and I had to move back to my mum and dad’s house, back into the room I shared with my brother when I was a kid. I kept getting people on the streets telling me that they loved me; it didn’t mean anything to me because I was still borrowing tenners off my pensioner father to go and get some chicken.
I’ve got high standards when it comes to boys. As my dad says, all girls should! I’m from the South – Tennessee, to be exact – and down there, we’re all about southern hospitality. I know that if I like a guy, he better be nice, and above all, my dad has to approve of him!
My mom and dad divorced when I was 8 years old, but my Dad never left my life. We would go over there on weekends and he’d be playing his guitar, listening to Bobby Blue Bland and B. B. King and KBLX radio while he was out in the garage painting custom cars.
A father is a man who expects his son to be as good a man as he meant to be.
My dad is my support, and he is the best support that I could ever have.
My dad is a chemical engineer, and my mom was a teacher. They were pretty serious about education, but I always thought about things a little bit differently.
And I love Mel Brooks. My Dad loved his movies, too, they’re awesome, the kind of thing that if you’re in for ten minutes, you’re in for two hours.
I was bored one day, so my dad took me to this acting school. I liked it more than having fun – I liked it for an actual job.
I always thought I would die of cancer because my mom and my dad both died of cancer. My dad died of osteocancer, and my mom died of colon cancer.
Because of my father, we are that Shining City on a Hill.
My dad’s a fitness freak himself.
Steph’s such a good dad for girls. He’s super attentive, and he’s, like, not too manly to get down on the floor and play with them and have a tea party.
It’s an ongoing joy being a dad.
My dad was a quiet assassin. He was really charming and smiley and softly spoken, but he could knock you out in a second.
The child is father of the man.
My mom is Filipino and my dad is half Russian and half Irish.
It is impossible to please all the world and one’s father.
I look for strong people. I don’t like people who’ll say yes to everything I might bring up. I want people who can argue and disagree and have a point of view that’s reflected in the magazine. My dad believed in the cult of personality. He brought great writers and columnists to ‘The Standard.’
My dad had this thing – everyone in Canada wants to play hockey; that’s all they want to do. So when I was a kid, whenever we skated my dad would not let us on the ice without hockey sticks, because of this insane fear we would become figure skaters!
I happily went on holiday with my parents until I was 18, because we always had such a good time that I didn’t want to venture off and do my own thing. I have very fond memories of those holidays with my brother, mum, and dad.
I found out when I was 18 that Dad had left my mother and the family before he realised he was ill and then died. When I asked Mum about it, she just sort of shrugged it off and said she’d thought I knew about it all along. Of course I hadn’t, though I’m sure she must have been desperately unhappy at the time.
It was tough times in Ohio when we lived there. My dad was between unemployed and just selling random knickknacks at a flea market. My mom was a cashier at a Chinese food restaurant. They both had awesome careers back in Taiwan, and they came here for my sister and I.
I grew up with the Highwaymen, which was Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings and Kris Kristofferson. Mom and Dad rode rodeo, so country music was always in the house and the car. They threw in some Dolly Parton, too.
I always wear my dad’s shirts.
I never saw any of my dad’s stories. My mother said he had piles and piles of manuscripts.
My mother’s proud of where she’s from, and her history, and her past, and same with my dad. I have roots in Africa. Like, I am from Africa as well as from Germany, and I am very proud of that.
My dad was an interior design and furniture person. I started working with him for four years before my first TV writing break.
I am blessed to have Mom and Dad.
I’d like to continue to spread my message on conservation and make sure my dad’s message – his legacy – lives on.
I think there’s nothing better than laughing in life, so that’s nice, to be thought of as someone who can make someone laugh. It’s ’cause I think life is hard. You know, my dad was a really silly man. A great Irish silly man. And that’s fine.
We all have experiences in our lives that change us, and we all learn from people, like my dad, but at the end of the day, it’s only us. And we’re only responsible to make ourselves happy.
My dad was a high school and college coach, and in my house my dad muted sideline reporters because he wasn’t interested in what they had to say.
It was so weird that I would end up directing ‘The Greatest Game Ever Played,’ because, y’know, I’m not a big golfer myself. But I grew up around the game. My mom and dad kind of built their dream house off the 11th fairway of Shady Oaks Country Club in Fort Worth.
My dad’s one true quest in life was for the Platonic ideal of peanut butter. And I remember one day he announced, with a look of utter transfiguration on his face, that he had found paradise on Earth in a jar with a yellow cap. And it was called Red Wing.
Obviously, having my dad’s last name, I think that’s more the chip on my shoulder because it has been a mixed blessing. I always will have the Flair stigma, and I think that’s where I deserve to be there or this, or I’m not just his daughter. I think that’s the chip on my shoulder.
My Father had a profound influence on me. He was a lunatic.
My dad was like a stage mother he always pushed me to do what I wanted.
It was my dad who encouraged me to come into films.
I have been called many things in public life, but the cap that best fits is that of the centrist dad.
My dad used to wake me up at 5:30 in the morning and hit me ground balls and tell me, ‘Don’t be afraid to excel. Don’t be afraid to be great.’
I was in the bath at the time, and my dad came running in and said, ‘Guess who they want to play Harry Potter!?’ and I started to cry. It was probably the best moment of my life.
My dad always pointed out Louis Armstrong’s pad when we passed by there. And me and my dad were both proud Louis Armstrong was from New Orleans.
Every celebrity in the world, if their movie bombs or whatever, they hold their kid up on a magazine and say, ‘I’m really a dad.’
When I was on ‘The Real World,’ I moved back to Cleveland, and I had a choice: My dad was like, ‘You should stay in Cleveland and be the big name out here.’ I was like, ‘But no, Dad, I wanna be a WWE superstar.’
My dad was enlisted in the Navy; my mother was a nurse. It just was never a thought process. It was just go to the best school you can go to, do the best you possibly can do, and be the best person you can possibly be, and I think our faith had a lot to do with that.
My dad was my hero. And I got my personality from my mother.
My dad was Dublin born and bred – a Dublin boy – but he always pushed me to play for what was Wales Under-15s in my day.
My dad was working abroad, in Iraq, and he was a doctor. We used to go and visit him, in Baghdad, off and on. For the first ten years of my life, we used to go backwards and forwards to Baghdad, so that was quite amazing. I spent a lot of time traveling around the Middle East.
As a family, we all loved the Flyers. To me, rooting for the Flyers were how I bonded with my dad especially.
My father never raised his hand to any one of his children, except in self-defense.
I write about love, but it’s me wanting to be in love. I’ve never been in love. I love my mom, my dad. I want to be in love. I think I have to allow myself to get there. I’m just so in love with music. It’s weird. I’m at a crossroads because I want to be in love.
I’m just going to try and be a good dad and not spoil the kid: give him love and encouragement but also discipline. Me and my woman, we don’t want him to feel too entitled.
My Dad was from Liverpool, and he picked it up in the army. He’d often come out with this stuff.
Love and fear. Everything the father of a family says must inspire one or the other.
Although I grew up in London, I spent summers in Missouri, where my dad lived. It’s quite a liberal town, Kansas City. You’d be surprised.
I had one of the most outdoorsy childhoods you could imagine. I basically lived in the woods until I was 13. My dad and I built a huge treehouse in our backyard in Chesterfield, about 30 feet in the air. And we’d vacation on an island in Michigan, where I hunted a deer that we ate.
My dad was a laborer. And he used to get up at 5:30 every morning. He worked for 50 years of his life, in all weathers for, by showbiz standards, petty cash. I remind myself of that when I feel a little bit spoiled or hard done by.
All my money is in a savings account. My dad has explained the stock market to me maybe 75 times. I still don’t understand it.
Anyone can be a father, but it takes someone special to be a dad, and that’s why I call you dad, because you are so special to me. You taught me the game and you taught me how to play it right.
My mum and dad are pretty amazing chefs and they spent most of my childhood cooking really extravagant things for my sister and me.
My dad’s not here, but he’s watching in heaven.
I grew up in Gothenburg, Sweden. I also lived in Ghana for four years and in Australia for one year. My dad was working abroad so we traveled with him. My mom is Indian and was adopted in Sweden.
My father taught me that the only way you can make good at anything is to practice, and then practice some more.
My dad? He worked at a steel plant over in Charleston. Night shift. Nine at night to nine in the morning, no joke.
I never made it to the school choir because the music teacher didn’t like my voice. I was pretty sad. But he was probably right; I did have a voice a bit like a goat, but my dad told me to never give up and to keep going, and it’s paid off.
My love for American music and American movies is from an early age. I was 10 or 11 when I heard Fats Domino and Little Richard and Buddy Holly. And the movies, my dad used to take my brother and I to the movies every Friday. It was incredible: we got to see just about every movie that came out for a period of years.
Without my dad, I wouldn’t be here.
