I remember skating around the lake’s three islands with my friend Gren Distin, nephew of Mo Distin of Saranac Lake. We were exhausted by the time we got back.

Growing up in the hotel business meant that we were never able to celebrate Christmas on Christmas day because we were working. The Mirror Lake Inn was always full, plus many in town came to the inn for their Christmas dinner or ordered a roast turkey with all the fixings that they’d pick up and serve at home.

We’d celebrate Christmas with the hotel’s staff about a week to 10 days before Christmas. A week before, the staff would put their names in a basket, which was shaken, and people would reach in and get a name; they’d then be the secret Santa for that person. If they drew their name, they’d pick another and toss theirs back in. By and large, everyone in the kitchen and wait staff hoped they’d get chef Fred Richards’ name, as he had a way of giving everyone a hard time or playing some joke on them over the previous year. So, the opportunity for good-natured and, at times, ribald playback was a dream held by many.

The way it worked, everyone gathered around a Christmas tree in the living room. Soon, we’d hear jangling bells from above that would come closer with shouts of “Ho Ho Ho!” Down the stairs and into the room would come Santa, my Uncle Dean, dressed up with his large bag of gifts over his shoulder. Naturally, he took his time handing out presents, knowing the longer he could hold out on passing out Fred, Herb, Ethel and others’ highly anticipated gifts, the better.

A big deal at our house when we lived on Swiss Hill, and even when we moved down to Wilmington Road, was checking out our Christmas stockings. They had been knitted for each of us by Grossmama, my German grandmother, my mother’s mother. They were huge, two feet long, and had the year of our birth on one side and our first name on the other. They could contain quite a variety of stuff; a treat was getting a large orange, considered a delicacy at the time.

Our stockings were filled with games, some articles of clothing like mittens, candy, small wrapped presents, and all manner of goodies. It would take us quite a while to get through our stocking. We’d carefully unwrap the gifts so the paper, bows, and ribbon could be used again. We greatly anticipated opening the tin of German Christmas cookies our Grossmama had baked and sent us.

Grossmama filled the tin with cookies like Butterpltzchen (butter), Haferpltzchen (oatmeal), Haselnussmakronen (hazelnut), Lebkuchen (ginger), Linzer (jam-filled), Pfeffernsse (spice), Springerle, Spritzgebck (spritz), and Zimtsterne (cinnamon stars and moons) as well as others. My brothers Chris, Gerret, and I could only select one cookie a day, and we took turns deciding who was the first to choose a cookie. Those waiting their turn were always in anguish as we prayed someone else wouldn’t take the one we pined for.

I never liked working in the Mirror Lake Inn dining room. Perhaps because that’s where I, then very young, started by carrying around the relish tray or pushing the dinner roll cart from table to table, tasks I never enjoyed. I much preferred working in the kitchen, though that meant starting as a dishwasher, moving to pots and pans, and then to the pantry bakery, where I handled everything from appetizers and salads, learning to bake, and making the Inn’s famous Adirondack flapjacks.

As chef Richards was not keen on having a Wikoff behind the range, I didn’t get there until he left the inn to start his own business. Then Herb Rock took over and quickly brought me behind the range. Before long, I was the breakfast cook, which required me to come in early to open the kitchen, make the bacon, sausage, hash and hot cereal, and be ready to cook all the incoming egg dishes, waffles, pancakes and specialty items to order.

When in college, I cooked during Thanksgiving and Christmas. One year, we had a ton of snow, so much so that it was nearly impossible to drive up Main Street. My solution was to cross-country ski to work. That worked fine until I passed the fire station, located where Cunningham’s is now. The doors opened, and a police vehicle roared out, flashers going and siren wailing. The officer barely reached the middle of the street before getting stuck. His wheels were spinning, but he couldn’t go forward or backward. So, he rolled down his window and started yelling and waving me to come over, so I did.

He asked who I was and then started writing me a ticket for being a hazard and getting in the way of the town highway crews clearing the roads. Looking around, I couldn’t see any road crews in any direction. The only car impeding potential traffic or the town plow was his. I was also annoyed because he was delaying me getting to work; I knew I would be in serious trouble if I couldn’t have the kitchen in time.

So, I took the ticket and skied off. Later, I shared the ticket with my father, who was then president of the chamber of commerce. At the chamber weekly breakfast meeting the next day, he asked the police chief Charles Prasse how it would look in the New York Times to read that people could get arrested in Lake Placid for skiing in a snowstorm. My ticket was torn up.

Another memorable Christmas was when I arrived for work with a patch over one eye. While working in the engraving studio at Pratt, a small piece of metal got into my eye that required me to go to the Brooklyn Eye, Ear and Throat Hospital to get it removed. Cooking breakfast at the Inn required flipping eggs in a pan, lowering the pan as the egg came down so the yolk wouldn’t break. By now, I was practiced enough to flip eggs with both hands simultaneously. But not with a patch over one eye, I quickly learned. I’d miss the pan entirely or partially with the cooked eggs splatting on the floor.

I went through a good dozen until I figured out how to successfully flip and catch the eggs with only one eye.

(Naj Wikoff lives in Keene Valley. He has been covering events for the Lake Placid News for more than 15 years.)