It's almost an impossible task to sum up all the things my parents have taught me over the years. Whether it was how to tie my shoelaces or encouragement in whatever career choice I wanted to pursue, they have both always been there to support me.
Most families need both parents to work. Moms need to be able to work and earn fair pay and have the flexibility in their jobs to also be primary caretakers.
As a youngster, my parents made me aware that all that was from the African Diaspora belonged to me. So I came in with Caribbean music, African music, Latin music, gospel music and blues.
I remember watching 'The Carol Burnett Show' with my parents as a kid. All those weird outfits she wore, like turtlenecks and long skirts, really stayed in my head.
I was born May 31, 1911, in Paris. My parents owned a small cheese shop, and my maternal grandfather was a carpentry worker. I thus came from what is commonly known as the working class.
In 1966, I bought my parents a carriage clock for their silver wedding anniversary. It was last wound 30 years later, in December 1996, the month my father died.
I didn't always spell my name Bil. My parents named me Bill, but when I started drawing cartoons on the wall, they knocked the 'L' out of me.
Even as a teenager, my sensibility was different because my parents introduced me to some amazing films. I grew up watching films like 'Kabuliwala,' 'Casablanca,' and 'Mandi.'
Because I was born in Casablanca and my parents were from the south of Spain, I do not have a big central root in France. I feel French but in a few ways, not at all French.
My parents own a restaurant in downtown Oakland - Garden House - and I started working there at 8. I'd work the cash register while people looked at me skeptically. Free child labor!
My parents are from the South - they were both born in Birmingham - so my dad saw R.E.M. really early on when they were playing college stuff in Athens. He had a bunch of their cassettes from the '80s, and when I was 8, 9, or 10, those were the sort of things that were around the cassette player in the living room.
My parents are musicians. I was listening to the radio and recording songs off the radio on cassette tapes and playing guitars and pianos. Just emotionally responding to music from a very young age.
'Castles Made of Sand' was a song that my parents put me to sleep to, so naturally, it still puts me in a zen state.
Luckily, I have two of the coolest parents around. They're so open about having any and all experiences, so they never hindered us in any way by categorizing or judging anything.
The traveling that 'Catfish' affords us and the cross-section of America that we see on a constant basis, I would have never gotten that living in the bubble that is Los Angeles or going home to visit my parents in the bubble that is New York.
My parents reverted to their Catholic faith through the charismatic renewal, so I was raised charismatic.
Catholic schools in our Nation's education have been paramount in teaching the values that we as parents seek to instill in our children.
By offering an education centered on values, the faculty in Catholic schools can create an interactive setting between parents and students that is geared toward long-term healthy character and scholastic development for all enrolled children.
Distrust and caution are the parents of security.
I didn't realize how limiting an R rating is. I made 'Disco' as a cautionary tale for 14- and 15-year-old girls, and those girls were not allowed to see the film by their parents.
