I feel like I've lived quite a sheltered life, like my mom and dad were quite protective of me.
I bought a house for my mom, I bought a house for my dad, I bought a house for my sister.
I watched Italia '90 with my Mum and Dad and my brother, you know, leaping around the house when the penalties were on... It would be great to be part of that, to have that kind of impact.
I'm not an American, but I have this weird connection to America in different ways through my dad living here for five years, my godfather being an American who I'm very close to.
My dad was a baggage handler at Heathrow and careful with money. He worked hard and had three jobs when I was young. I wish I'd inherited his care for money. Sadly, I've grown up to be rather scatty when it comes to finances.
Before breaking into music, I had various jobs: forklift driver, driving a courier. But I was forced into working rather than doing it off my own bat because that was my dad's way: you got a job and paid your way.
I have one brother, John, an airline pilot, who is seven years younger. He's adopted, though we're still blood related - he's my cousin. My parents couldn't have any more children after me, so when Dad's brother died, they adopted John, then just a baby.
I met Gemma, my wife, when she was 12. She had a schoolgirl crush on me and her dad had arranged for her to meet me. Later, she started coming to my concerts, but I only got to know her well after her mother died. I rang to see how she was, and that's how it started.
My dad is like a cactus - introverted and tough. I'm a people person, like my mom, but I got my competitiveness from my dad. He came to this country from Belarus with nothing and built a real business. He's my hero for giving me that need to run a business and for having enormous confidence in me.
I'm concerned a little bit with the culture of celebrating the fundraise. My dad taught me that when you borrow money it's the worst day of your life.
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.
People who build family businesses are not classically trained. They have to deal with an enormous amount of politics. You think corporate politics are tough? Go work for your dad or your mom.
My parents were kind of over protective people. Me and my sister had to play in the backyard all the time. They bought us bikes for Christmas but wouldn't let us ride in the street, we had to ride in the backyard. Another Christmas, my dad got me a basketball hoop and put it in the middle of the lawn! You can't dribble on grass.
My mom grew up in poverty in Oklahoma - like Dust Bowl, nine people in one room kind of place - and the way she got out of poverty was through education. My dad grew up without a dad, with very little and he also made his way out through education.
I am lucky to have had an attentive, curious and loving dad and heart-smart, down-to-earth, gifted mother. They changed the outlooks of their own lives and have never forgotten the people and organizations that helped them dream bigger than their circumstances should have allowed.
My dad and my uncles owned a bar outside of Cincinnati. I worked there growing up, mopping floors, waiting tables.
My hat was pulled down and this girl said 'Are you really him?' I whispered 'Yeah, I'm really him.' She screamed, 'Mom! Dad! It's Heath Ledger!
My dad works in child protection and he's spent many, many years in that line of work.
At one point my dad called me and said, 'You have always been a great salesman. I think it's time you come home and sell swimming pools.'
You know, my mother's beautiful, my dad was a really handsome man, and there was a lot of talk about looks when I was growing up.
I mean, my dad's a television producer, and I knew I could get a job as an assistant or a reader with one of his friends, but it wasn't exactly what I wanted to do.
My dad had this philosophy that if you tell children they're beautiful and wonderful then they believe it, and they will be. So I never thought I was unattractive. But I was never one of the girls at school who had lots of boyfriends.
It's a complex relationship when your dad happened to be president and you are president and then you have all the amateur psychology that goes on when people try to speculate about motivations.
My guess is my brother would call his mom and his dad pretty regularly, a lot more than I probably did.
I'm lucky because my dad taught me to be frugal and save. And that's important because I want to know that I don't have to take an acting job for two or three years if I don't want to and that I'll still be able to make my house and car payments and buy food for my dogs.
My mom and dad just loved the fact that I fooled around. They just embraced it. They'd always kind of enjoy it, and they liked it when I made them laugh.
Often as a child you see someone with a learning disability or Down's Syndrome and my mum and dad were always very quick to explain exactly what was going on and to be in their own way inclusive and welcoming.
When I started writing, I did have some idealised notion of my dad as a writer. But I have less and less of a literary rivalry with him as I've gone on. I certainly don't feel I need his approval, although maybe that's because I'm confident that I've got it.
It was, you know, probably 80 degrees out in L.A., and my dad took me outside and there was snow. At the time, I thought, 'Every kid doesn't have snow in their backyard on Christmas?'
I'd like to play Matt Damon's daddy. He's a wonderful actor, I really admire him, and I'd like to play his dad one day.
The one thing that kept our family together was the music. The only thing that our family would share emotionally was to have our dad cry over something the kids did with music.
I am the granddaughter of a Welsh coal miner who was determined that his kids get out of the mines. My dad got his first job when he was six years old, in a little village in Wales called Nantyffyllon, cleaning bottles at the Colliers Arms.
It's just really making sure I am doing the best job I can do as a dad. I do think that is my No. 1 job.
My dad read the Bible ten times, and I want to do it in my lifetime. But it's definitely tough getting through.
My Dad was from Liverpool, and he picked it up in the army. He'd often come out with this stuff.
My mother always taught me, even my dad, just never let other people's opinions of you shape your opinion of yourself. And I never have and I never will.
I loved climbing because of the freedom, and having time and space. I remember coming off Everest for the last time, thinking of Dad and wishing that he could have seen what I saw. He would have loved it.
Becoming a dad means you have to be a role model for your son and be someone he can look up to.
I was lucky to have my dad in my life. As crazy as things got, I always had him to put his hand on my shoulder.
Within our culture, every school has a swimming pool. We lived on the coast. People swam in the surf. It's a very sporty nation and at that particular time anyone who had an artistic bent was very much an outsider. So if you liked reading or ideas or playing the piano then your dad viewed you as a sissy, basically.
My dad always taught me to never be satisfied, to want more and know that what is done is done.
My dad was always such a frustrated artist. He always worked very hard to support his family, doing a bunch of ridiculous jobs. He wanted to be a painter, but then he also wrote science-fiction novels in his spare time.
The founder of the Mona Foundation actually knew my dad for years, and the more I learned about it, the more I realized I really found the perfect charity. It sponsors schools and educational initiatives all over the planet.
I had bohemian parents in Seattle in the last '60s living in a houseboat. My dad wrote science fiction novels and painted big murals and oil paintings.
As a father now, I wouldn't do what my dad did, because it left me feeling emotionally unstable as a kid. But he didn't do the things he did out of selfishness or malice.