Of course, growing up, you listen to your favorite people on the radio and you want to have an album of your own and you want to have number one songs that people know and can sing back to you when you have shows.
I felt like the luckiest kid in the world. And I was. I was growing up middle-class in a time when growing up middle-class in America meant there would be jobs for my parents, good schools for me to prepare myself for a career, and, if I worked hard and played by the rules, a chance for me to do anything I wanted.
I lived in South America when I was growing up. I spent hours sketching. I was good at drawing, and I was obsessed with fashion, but I was also obsessed with magazines.
When you’re growing up, your dad is your superhero. Once you’ve let yourself fall that in love with someone, once you put him on such a high pedestal and he lets you down, you never want to experience that pain again.
A flapper is just a little girl trying to grow up – in the process of growing up.
I attended theater camps and classes growing up, but there was never any talk of me making a life out of acting. My parents were much too practical and grounded for that.
I played a ton of team sports growing up, and team wins are just incredibly gratifying.
When I was a kid a growing up in Ontario, Canada, Lake Erie was so polluted, I never thought it would ever, EVER be turned around where they could start cleaning it out in my lifetime!
I grew up on the west side of Detroit – 6 mile and Wyoming – so I was really in the ‘hood. And I would go to school at Detroit Waldorf, and that was not the ‘hood. Growing up in Detroit was good. I had a good perspective, a well-rounded one, and not being one-sided.
I never read too many comic books when I was growing up, but I think everyone loved Wolverine, you know what I’m saying?
I guess growing up I realized that there is really this huge epidemic in a city like Los Angeles, and many other cities, where they put down thousands upon thousands of animals every day.
I lived to play basketball. Growing up as a kid, Bill Russell and the Boston Celtics were my favorite team. The way they played, the teamwork, the sacrifice, the commitment, the joy, the camaraderie, the relationship with the fans.
We talked about politics constantly in my family growing up in North Carolina. There were always debates. Being of Greek background, it’s in our blood to drink coffee and talk politics.
‘Lost’ was filmed in Hawaii, so we stayed there and loved it, so we thought, ‘Why would we leave?’ It is a bit like growing up in a bubble, but I don’t think that’s a bad thing, as you will eventually get out and see the real world.
I did grow up with Michael Landau, my brother since we were 12 years old. That was competition but in the best way. He is such a monster, always was, and we had a blast growing up playing in bands and early recording and are still the best of pals.
I guess growing up, it was pretty much a normal life, as I got older I used to get into some fights but nothing unusual.
Growing up in the Sacramento Valley in the ’70s, we were all pretty big into cars. Of course, I had to nerd out and be a fan of Bob Tullius’ Group 44 Jaguars instead of Corvettes/Camaros.
I was the biggest tomboy growing up. Now I love playing with a full face of makeup.
It was a reaction to when I was growing up, and women were supposed to be all blonde hair, gold suntan, and pink lips. It was a real black-and-white opposite of what was considered attractive. I was kicking against something I found really oppressive.
Money was a big differentiator when I was growing up, but I made sure it doesn’t stay that way.
I was a huge Muppet fan growing up, but that was the extent of my puppet knowledge. I really loved the art form and the whole Henson universe.
I’m very sensitive. Because my mum was my primary emotional caregiver growing up, I found myself being pinned into dresses, darting her dresses, choosing her high heels for the evening or what to wear. I’m very much a mommy’s boy.
Being a kid growing up with Kurosawa films and watching Sergio Leone movies just made me love what it could do to you, and how it could influence you – make you dream.
I had a really bad temper, when I was growing up. Sport helped me channel that temper into more positive acts.
Growing up with Koli boys is a different experience. It teaches you survival.
I remember very vividly, as a child growing up in England, living through the Cuban Missile Crisis. For a few days, the entire biosphere seemed to be on the verge of destruction. And the same weapons are still here, and they’re still armed. If we avoid that trap, others are waiting for us.
I was a big fan of sketch comedy and cartoons growing up.
I felt like a dork growing up so this is shocking.
I love storytellers. When I was growing up, my inspirations were watching Eddie Murphy, Dennis Wolfberg, and Louie Anderson. These guys were great at telling stories, and I made that my own style, talking about things that happened to me and trying to make them funny.
Growing up in Finland, ice hockey was the main sport. But I never played that. I went with footy. I never had any other hobbies.
My feeling about growing up in New Jersey was, ‘How come I’m not in New York?’ That being said, I’m older and I have a better worldview now, and so I think I grew up in an incredibly privileged position. The town I grew up in is beautiful. I got a great education, and I’m very grateful for it.
I remember growing up, having sports to go to, having recess, those were the things I looked forward to. Yes, I’m an athlete, but I had buddies who weren’t, and they looked forward to it, too.
But the truth is, growing up in California, we knew nothing about hockey.
My father, who was illiterate, smoothed iron for Ford Dagenham and we’d get up at 5;30 A.M. to give him a jump-start. My mother was a nurse and part of the Windrush generation. Growing up in east London, we were financially poor, but rich in hope and dignity, and we were happy.
I’ve always liked trees. And then, growing up, I took an interest in ecology, hedges being destroyed, the landscape being turned into prairies.
I can think of no one that my grandparents knew, that told me stories and that I experienced myself, had any sense of social inferiority growing up in segregated Washington. None whatsoever.
Everything will change. The only question is growing up or decaying.
When I was growing up, I always read horror books, while my sister read romance novels.
I always drank chocolate milk growing up and I remember my grandmother would always have it when I would visit her in the Dominican Republic – that’s when it all started.
I learned how to sign because when I was growing up in California in order to get into college you needed two semesters of language to get into a University of California school.
I think that’s good that I have to watch how I act and what I say. I think that’s a part of growing up.
I was always good at fixing things growing up. I wanted to work on boats. That was what my dad did.
Absolutely the worst thing about this job is the travel and being away from family. I have a wife and three wonderful children, the kids are all active in sports and it’s very difficult to up and leave and miss them growing up.
I was lucky enough to know exactly what I wanted to do when I was growing up. I think one of the hardest things to figure out in life is what your calling is, and what truly makes you happy – not what you want to work at, but what you want to do.
What you learn growing up in a place like Buffalo is that your job isn’t just your paycheck, it’s your identity. It doesn’t just give you dollars, it gives you dignity.
My choice growing up was the ‘Star Wars’ role playing game. At that time in the Nineties, they had a pretty robust pen and paper system.
The thing about being an actor is that you’re in the business of not growing up.
A large part of the problem, is that young people are being born into the world and growing up without much hope. And so, they become murderers, they become suicide bombers.
I don’t care about age very much. I think back to the old people I knew when I was growing up, and they always seemed larger than life.
Every child is so different. Their experience growing up and their experience relating to the world has so much to do with their temperament, and their likes and their dislikes.
I always had music growing up, but music was also like a journal. It was like my personal diary or personal journal. A lot of the things I couldn’t express to an individual, I would express them in my music.
The truth was I felt ugly growing up. I only really started feeling comfortable in myself when I was 40.
Athletics are not my wheelhouse because sports were mean to this uncoordinated kid growing up, a 6-foot-2 14-year-old who never could do a layup.
I grew up on 23, country music highway, which is a stretch of road where Ricky Skaggs and Dwight Yoakam and Loretta Lynn played. Driving up and down that on the way to school – to baseball games, to anywhere – you see all these signs commemorating these artists. It was a point of pride for my area growing up.
Fashion is such a weird thing. Growing up, I just made do with whatever I had access to – a lot of hand-me-downs and thrift store shopping.
