<p>HS - electric typewriter
College - trip to Hawaii with girlfriends.</p>
<p>I didn’t appreciate either.</p>
<p>High school - a nice watch. College - another nice watch, since I’d broken the first one. Lost the second one. I have such bad luck with watches that I never buy expensive ones, and have asked family members not to give me nice ones as gifts. I’m not worthy. :)</p>
<p>HS: clock radio, which worked and was used for 25 years.</p>
<p>College: a curio cabinet, still in use in my bedroom. My mom had a little party for relatives (I was the oldest grandchild by 9 years) and an uncle got me a nice Samsonite suitcase. Yesterday she pulled it from her attic and asked if I knew anything about it. We are putting it in the garage sale. Nice gift at the time, but I can’t see using a hard-shell suitcase without wheels in my future. It would probably need its own ticket!</p>
<p>Frazzled–mom gave me a nice watch for my 18th birthday. While on my senior year summer abroad, I stuck it in my back pocket while I climbed/slithered down a ravine near Devil’s Bridge, Wales.</p>
<p>It’s still in there, somewhere.</p>
<p>I am death to nice jewelry.</p>
<p>I got a pair of gold plated earrings and my mother said don’t lose them because they were expensive. They cost $17.00! I do remember my aunt and uncle got me a jewelry box and I still have it 30-some years later.</p>
<p>
So am I! I’ve never had a piece of decent jewelry that I haven’t lost or broken. My wedding ring is still intact. But I once lost my engagement ring for a while. It was after we were married and had kids - for some reason, I needed to take my rings off in the living room, the engagement slipped off, I heard it hit metal, couldn’t find it anywhere, and presumed it had gone down the heating vent. When we moved the piano several months later, it was underneath! I’ve had it in a drawer since then - it should be reset, but now I’m used to not wearing it, and it’s safer in the dresser. 
Think of what a nice surprise your watch will be to an archeologist someday!</p>
<p>I got half the $1500 purchase price of a 1974 Mustang II (this was in 1980). I earned my half working at Wendy’s. I was going to be commuting and my having a car made their lives easier too. I don’t remember getting a college graduation gift per se, but they did pay the deposits and fees for my first apartment.</p>