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Listeners' favorite gifts:

It was important because it let the kid inside me and the rest of the group out to play a little bit. Call it 'recaptured youth' -- in two 15-minute battles.
Giftee: David Weinstock, Vermont
Gift: a surprise laser-tag birthday party

My boyfriend, a seasoned traveler, introduced me to the world with a trip to France, Spain and Morocco. New language, culture, food and worldviews gave me heightened awareness of the unity in the world, in spite of superficial differences. Seeing new places and learning new cultures is a reflection of what he has brought into my life.
Giftee: Teresa Roach, Georgia
Gift: travel

In Vientiane, Laos, I had met some lovely people who lived by the morning market. The people had very little. I spent several afternoons there playing paddy cake and took photos of all of the kids, and gave them to parents. One day, I arrived and they presented me with two gifts wrapped in shiny paper. I was touched by this and felt horrible that they had spent money on me. I still get teary eyes thinking of it, but it's another example of something I learned from traveling: that often, it's the people with the least that will give you the shirt off their backs.
Giftee: Jack McCartor, Oregon
Gift: two bars of soap

There is a too-little known tradition that says giving someone a single penny is a silent way to say 'I love you.' During my last year in graduate school, I was going away for a 6-week externship. My shy, soft-spoken boyfriend was helping me pack, carefully folding the clothes. When I unpacked, I found each pocket held a single penny. Each morning. 19 years later, that same soft-spoken fellow makes me a cup of tea and keeps it warm by covering it with a saucer holding a single penny.
Giftee: Rebecca Levin, Ohio
Gift: a handful of pennies

When I was a Freshman at Indiana University, my Dad had a drug store in Northern Indiana. He got me a new 1949 Red Jeepster. I washed the car once a week, winter and summer, and we still remember the fun we had in that cute convertible. My son recently found one for sale, so the Jeepster is once again a member of my family.
Giftee: Elinor Hendrix, Indiana
Gift: 1949 red Jeepster

It was the last present that my father ever gave to me before he died. It still brings back all of the fond memories I have of the afternoons I spent with my father back in the '60s and '70s watching the Orioles play at Memorial Stadium. I keep that bat and my World Series tickets from 1966 in a special place to remind me, always, what a great dad he was.
Giftee: Carl Simon, New Jersey
Gift: a personalized Louisville Slugger

I was so proud when I walked into my advanced science class with my calculator after Christmas. My classmates all gathered around to look at this most sophisticated toy. None of my peers had anything like this. I went on to become a computer programmer and am currently working as an Oracle database administrator. That HP-25 calculator, with its 49 steps of memory and 8 registers, was the beginning of a lifetime of computer programming for me.
Giftee: Geraldine O'Brien, South Carolina
Gift: HP-25 scientific programmable computer

My mother died when I was 11. Every year after that, my father would ask me what I wanted for Christmas and that is what I would get. The Christmas I was 19, I was not asked what I wanted. My father at the time was dating again. I opened my gift and there was this beautiful bracelet. It made me feel so grown up. My father passed away the following May.
Giftee: Hollace Widdowfield, Colorado
Gift: A gold bracelet with 18 cornflower blue sapphires.

I had been feeling like a stranded sea creature with no way to get back on the ocean. Suddenly, a friend gave me a very nice sailboat. ‘Ask, and ye shall receive.’
Giftee: Kendall Morse, Maine
Gift: 27-foot sailboat

It was not my birthday or Christmas. It was the ‘40s in LA. I don't think my parents had much money. I remember the smile on my father's face and the big hug I gave him.
Giftee: Peggy Elder, Washington
Gift: box with wooden dolls, doll clothes

It showed how proud my parents were of my interest in science. I believe they may have had second thoughts about the gift as Mom's freezer filled with various small animals awaiting dissection.
Giftee: Rene' Schmauder, South Carolina
Gift: microscope and dissecting kit, 5th grade

It came with a note from a woman I was seeing that said: ‘Please do not stay away from me any longer than you can using this suitcase.’ I still think of her every time I load it into an overhead storage bin.
Giftee: George Dies, California
Gift: carry-on travel suitcase

I was very young and I so believed in Santa Clause and this was, to me, just a confirmation that he was real and cared about me.
Giftee: Pat Lynn, North Carolina
Gift: letter from "Santa"

I learned to write at this desk. Now, I spend a good portion of each day at my desk at Texas Public Radio (KSTX, KPAC, and KTXI) in San Antonio, Texas. It seems truly fitting somehow.
Giftee: Larka Smallwood, Texas
Gift: an old-fashioned school desk

I am 51 years old now and have been a Cubs fan since I was eight years old. I can recite entire Cubs lineups from the ‘50s and ‘60s. They always were and always will be my team.
Giftee: Glenn Reedus, Michigan
Gift: trip to Chicago and a Cubs game

Hearing that story was meaningful to me because it managed to encapsulate both my grandfather's common sense and my dad's enthusiasm for learning; they both died way too soon to have given me that advice personally.
Giftee: Winifred Daisley, Maryland
Gift: personal anecdote about appreciating money

So, what's your best gift ever?