Keep Chewing The Granite: Unveiling Chalky White's Adventures

Bernard “Chalky” White is an internationally known ski instructor, bestselling author, and incredible storyteller. Chalky takes us through his journey from a difficult childhood in London to joining the Kent Police at 16, saving a newborn baby, and witnessing a horrific crime that pushed him to change his path. We talk about how his famous nickname stuck, how he failed multiple ski exams before finally breaking through in New Zealand, and the two questions that changed the direction of his life: What if I don't? and What if I do?

It is a powerful conversation about resilience, perseverance, and refusing to quit no matter the setbacks. You can find his latest book, Keep Chewing the Granite, on Amazon.

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Transcript

Intro Song

Rob Valincius: And we are recording another beautiful, thirsty Thursday, favorite day of the week outside of Friday. And this is the Drink o'clock podcast. I don't think my last podcast even introduced myself 'cause I just got right into it. But I'm your host, Rob Valincius, and I have the pleasure of having with me Bernard ‘Chalky’ White.

Now Bernard, you're an internationally known ski instructor. You're a number one bestselling author of, uh, I believe it's the Secrets of Skiing, an international

Bernard "Chalky" White: The seven being? Yeah.

Rob Valincius: yep. And then you also have a new book, which is keep chewing the Granite. How to Questions Can Change Your Life. Welcome to the show, man.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Thank you. I appreciate it and uh, I'm really looking forward to this. Thank you, Rob.

Rob Valincius: Absolutely. Now, now, Chucky, you mentioned before we hit record, you're in Mexico, man, what's the weather like down there?

Bernard "Chalky" White: Well, we had a rainstorm this afternoon actually, but, uh, most of the time it's beautiful and sunny and we've got, you know, tropical weather so you can, even in the middle of January, you can, you can get into the, into the ocean and it's still beautiful and warm. We've got great beaches, everything down here, and, uh, I've been living down, I've actually been living down here full time now for 10 years.

Um, before that I was, I was in, I was in the States for, for 20 years, actually an American citizen as being citizen. These.

Rob Valincius: That's cool, man. I mean, it's cold as shit up here, I'll tell you that. It's, uh, not fun. I, I'm a summer baby. I was born in July and I feel like I have an affinity to warm weather. And I gotta tell you, I'm the worst northeasterner on the planet. I've talked about on my show. I don't know what a coat, I don't know, boots. I just fly by the seat of my pants when it's cold out.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Well, I've actually got the AC on, so you,

Rob Valincius: Just, just rub it. Rub it in chalky. Just rub it in. Uh, alright, so, so, so, so if you've listened to my show or if you checked out any episodes, the way we love to start here, because obviously you know my audience, the whole point of my show is to really get a feel for you, right, who you are, where you came from.

So I know you have some, um, interesting childhood and, and growing up and all that. So, if you could go into some detail, tell us about, you know, growing up and, uh, I gotta know, you know, throughout that storyline there where, where your nickname Chalky came from.

Bernard "Chalky" White: well, maybe I should start with that. Um, yeah, when I was, when I was, uh, 16, just 16. I managed to, I joined the Kent Police Cadets, which is just south of London. And on, on the second day there we had to, me and all the other guys that I joined with had to go to the gymnasium dressed in our, you know, um, physical training kit.

And in comes the drill sergeant and, uh, I won't use the vernacular, we went around asking everybody their names and he gets to me and he said, and what's your bleeping name? I said, whiter. He said, and then he announced all the other guys were standing there, were in there as well. He said, Laddie said, we've got a chalky, a chalky wife.

And I've been stuck with that ever since. And it's, it's actually came in really handy because I've never really liked my first name. Uh, Bernard. Anyway, um, it's pronounced, by the way, not Bernard most.

Rob Valincius: Gotcha. All right.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Um, and it's been very useful down the years because especially in the ski business, as far as I know, I've never met another chalky in the ski business, so a lot of people didn't even know my last name.

So they, you know, they go into the ski and they just say, I want a lesson with chalky, and so on and so forth. Yeah. So, so that was that. But, but then, you know, my life, you, you, my childhood, um, wasn't very happy to be honest. Um, I had a very violent father who would not only beat me, but he would also, um, beat my mother who was, who was finally injured.

She had very bad back trouble. He would put her in a corner and he would beat her for basically for no reason. And, uh, and he would beat me on a regular basis as well, and I could forgive him for what he did for me, but what he did to my mother, I could never that anyway, so. What he always wanted from me was to be this great scholar, you know, which I was never gonna be all at that time.

All I wanted to do really was kick a football around, a soccer ball around, right? And, um, so what happened was, at the age of, and every year, or every, every semester or term as we call it in England, we get, get a school report to take home and show and show your parents, right? And anyway, didn't matter whether mine was good, bad, or indifferent, he beat me anyway.

He was never good in it, it was never good enough. So I'll get to the age of 13. I thought, well, you know, kids logic, he's gonna beat me anyway, so why bother? So I literally, at the age of 13, went on strike at school. And consequently, I get to the age of 16, take all, all, all my examination, know, English, math, physics, chemistry, all that stuff.

And I got an absolute duck egg absolute nun because I didn't do anything right. And of course, the old man, you know, my father says, well, what are you gonna do now? And I was just, you know, 16. I went, I don't know. And actually it was his idea, um, that I try and join the police cadets and I successfully managed to get into, into the Kent Police cadets.

And the really good news for me was I had to go and live away from home to do it. So basically I've been, I've, I've lived independently since I was 16 years old. Yeah. And so I, I, I was a cadet for, for uh, uh, two and a half years. And then, um, and then I joined the police, uh, uh, proper. I became a a, a Kent Police, uh, police constable.

Basically. We're in one of these, still got, actually, this one's the Metropolitan, because I transferred to the Metropolitan Police. But that, that's that one. This one goes back to 1969. Yeah.

Rob Valincius: That is cool. Old school.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Oh, very well. They, well, no, they still wear them. They still wear them today. Yeah. Um,

Rob Valincius: That is cool.

Bernard "Chalky" White: so, um, I was in the Kent Police and while I was in the Kent Police, I, I, I, I was witness to an, a very, very gruesome murder. It was actually the disempowerment of a young girl by a, a, a couple that were interested in black magic, and they, they disempowered this girl with a cutthroat razor.

And I was the first witness on the scene. And that story, that's one of the stories actually that's, that's in my book. Um, I couldn't, I mean, and it's, it's strange when something like that happens to you. I mean, it's something I've never, ever been able to forget. So anyway, after, after I've been in the Kent Police for, for three years, um, I decided to join the Metropolitan Police.

Oh, just before I go onto that. There was another great incident when I was in the Kemp Police, which was one of the greatest incident things that ever happened to me in my life when I helped to save a brand new born baby that still had its umbilical cord and placenta attached, and we managed to get it to hospital.

Yeah. And that was after a call came out. Sounds of a dying cat was the call. And, and people didn't know that it was a, it was a baby. Right. Anyway, I can explain more about that later. But anyway, so after three years, I'm now on getting on for 22. I then transferred back to London, uh, and joined the London Metropolitan Police Police.

Um, and in, when I was in that job and, and the thing that always gnawed at me was being a, being a policeman was not really what I wanted to do, although I think I was pretty good at it, and I was, I always got myself involved and tried, tried to actually do the job. I wanted out. I just always, always wanted out.

So, and by the, by the way, while I was in the Metropolitan Police, I was nearly murdered a couple of times. Um, I, I once had a, somebody had had me on the floor on top of me with, with a carving knife pointed right there. And I somehow managed to get, get him off. And, and another time, um, I had another, a guy with hands, he had fingers like bananas and had his, had his around throat like this again on the floor.

And I managed to, with this, again, this goes back to 1969, this was the policeman, which is just a stick, right? I somehow managed to get this thing outta my pocket. And I, and the only way I could get him off, I kept hitting him, hitting him, hitting him. And eventually he let go. And anyway, when I got to the age of, um, 26, I was asked.

Of the most important questions, maybe the most important question because it, it really changed my life. I was sitting in the police canteen eating a meal and a friend of mine, bill Grundy walks in and he said, and I'd never skied before, and he said, Hey Chalky, do you wanna go on a ski course or Sorry, do you wanna go on a ski vacation?

I said, yeah, I might. Anyway, um, I decided to go and I went, went to Italy the first time. Um, and then the second time I went to a place called a little country you might have heard of is in the ESE mountains just north of Barcelona in Spain, a place called Andorra. And I went there for my second vacation and there I saw all kinds of, um, people that are working in bars, working on ski list, and some of them were even ski instructors.

And I'm thinking, wow. I wouldn't mind having some of that somehow. So anyway, I'll go back to England and I, you know, as I said, I wanted to get out, I wanted, I wanted out, I wanted out, I wanted out, but I didn't have the guts to do it. And I still procrastinated even after all that, I procrastinated then.

Then one night in August, now in 1975, this is all back of course, when, when God was still a boy, right? Um, um, something came to me just inadvertently, these questions came to my mind and the first one I asked myself was something like, because I didn't write it down, what if I don't leave the police and go and try to fulfill my dreams of, of improving my skiing, traveling, and maybe even trying to become a ski instructor?

And the answers I came up with were, were, if I don't do this. This is a terrible word. I hate this word. I'll probably regret it for the rest of my life. And of course that kind of really made me miserable. You know,

Rob Valincius: Yeah.

Bernard "Chalky" White: and this is where these two questions, these what if questions are effective, you get an emotional, a change of emotion.

So, and then I ask myself, and this is when it occurred, but what if I do go and try to become a ski instructor and maybe travel, which is what I've always wanted to do. What could be the repercussions then? Well, I might actually be able to become a ski instructor and I might be able to travel, which I did an awful lot after that.

Well, the next day, the 10th of August, 1975, I resigned from the police the very next day. Never to return. They all kept saying to me, you'll be back. You'll be back, you'll be back. And of course, I never did. And that is literally, literally now 50 years ago. Yeah. Because

Rob Valincius: Wow.

Bernard "Chalky" White: I'm getting on 50 years ago. Right?

That was, that was when I was 20. Uh, and I actually, um, became a ski bum in, in 1975. Yeah. When I was actually, when I was 28 now. Yeah. And from that, I, I, um, what happened then was because I'd started so late in my, my, in my ski instruction career, most kids, most guys that become ski instructors start at a very young age.

They're infants or, or young, young boys and girls. Right. So they, they pick it up pretty easily. But I had terrible trouble trying to become a good skier, and I kept failing exams. The only one I ever passed the first time was the very first level. I passed that first time, but I failed the second level three times.

I failed the, uh, the full certification three times. It took me eight attempts to pass three ski instructors exams. And after and after my, the full certification, uh, exam that I taken for the third time up in Scotland, they, the, an, the examiners announced there, chalky white will never be fully certified because he's the wrong body shape because I've got bow bowed legs or bandi legs if we call 'em in England.

And I dunno what you might know about skiing, but do you ski?

Rob Valincius: I ha I used to snowboard a bit when I was younger, but I don't, I don't, I've never skied.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Alright, so when you, when you ski, what you're trying to do, you've got, obviously you've got two implements and one on one foot, one on the other. You're trying to put pressure on, on, on an inside edge, where, where, where your feet are closest together to make a turn. But because I was bow-legged, my, the edges of my skis were always up in the air like this.

So there was kind of fresh air between the bottom of the, my, my ski and the snow. So, and that was why they, they, they said, and that's the way he wanted me to ski. But then somebody gave me the idea of going to New Zealand 12,000 miles away on a wing and a prayer. I bought an air ticket to New Zealand and I meet a trainer there, and I, and I, and I ski, I ski with my feet close together like this.

And his words were, why are you skiing like that? I said, 'cause that's the way the Brits wanted me to ski. And his words were, well, if you get your god damn feet open, you might be able to ski. So I, I opened my feet like so. The skis now flatten and I can now put pressure on these inside edges. Now I can ski.

And that's when my skiing really took off. And I managed to pass the New Zealand full certification at the very first attempt. And even these days, that still the qualification I use in this day and age, and that's 41 years ago that happened. So it took me, it actually took to be cut from starting to ski until I, I, um, became fully qualified.

It took me nine years, pretty long time. But, um, but I got there and the big reason I got there again was these what if, what if questions? What if I don't? And what if I do? And from that, um, I, I ran my own ski business in France for a year, and that was a time when I should have used my what if questions and didn't.

It became a disaster. Nothing to do whatsoever with my teaching or clientele or any of that stuff. It was all to do with a, a building that I, I bought with a, with another guy to, to turn into a chalet where people could come and there'd be a gymnasium. We put 'em up, we could, could you have a lecture room and all this, but I got all the numbers wrong and what I should have done, and I didn't, I should have asked myself, what if I don't work out the figures properly to do this?

What will be the repercussions of me for me? And of course the answer to that would've been, well, it will be a disaster because you are gonna spend way, probably way too much money that you can't afford. And that's literally what happened. Spent too much because I didn't, you didn't actually ask myself those questions.

Got it completely wrong. And I had to, I had to leave the business. And the irony of it was I'd started dosing. The only guy that could carry on was my partner that I had, uh, which I shouldn't, I should never have taken on a partner in the first place, in retrospect. Anyway, um, so I had to leave and it was the first time in my life as I was almost destitute, but not, not all, all I had was one car.

I had a, I had a little car and I managed to drive it from the, from the French Alps all the way up to the French Coast, you know, opposite to, to England and to, to get over to England. I get out my, my credit card 'cause I didn't have any cash and they wouldn't take the credit card's. The only way I could get my car and me across the, across the, the English channel, was to call a friend and say, can you, can you let, uh, lend me the money to buy a ticket?

And he paid with his credit card and I managed to get across to the channel. And I got there and the very next day I went to a cab office. A taxi cab office. I said, I wanna start work now. And the big reason that I wanted to start work right then was because as you probably well know, you get paid in cash a lot of the time as a cab driver.

So now I actually could have some money. Yeah. And I did that for a couple of years and that's when, after that I went to, um, I went to a ski show and cutting a long story short, I met a co couple of ski instructors from that worked in Vail in Colorado. And they said, well, why don't you try and work in the States?

They said, we probably hope you get a job. Well, they did. One of them wrote me a letter, I got accepted, and instead of going to to to Vail, you might have heard of this place. They, they, they sent me to Beaver Creek, which is all part of the Vail and it's actually called the Vail and Beaver Creek Ski School.

And I worked there for 20, I worked there for 25 years. But in the meantime, while I was there, that's when I wrote my ski instruction book. The Seven Secrets of Skiing, it's actually called, there's a story behind that as well. It's actually called Chalky Whites, uh, the Seven Secrets of Skiing. There's a story behind that too, and that somehow went on and, and it became a number one bestseller in its category on amazon.com.

And now, of course, as you know, I've written this new book, keep Chewing The Granite. And, uh, first of all, I wrote that as a, as just as a memoir because I thought I had some pretty interesting stories to tell, you know, through my police career and my, my, my veils, my, my difficulties in becoming a, a ski instructor.

Uh, but then someone said, well, why don't you try and make it a how to book so that people have got something that they can, they can actually use to actually help to. Enhance their own lives and improve and, and be able to achieve things. And of course, you know, I'd use these, these what if questions, what if I don't?

And what if I do many times down the years? And, um, so that's what I've done, is I've, I've, after every single chapter in the book I've used, I've given a an example of the way you might be able to use what if I don't, and what if I do? And now, as you, as you well know, um, I'm now living in the Caribbean, which can't be bad.

All the, all the way from a London slum, which ran with mice, um, all the way to living in this beautiful place. So I'm, I'm a very lucky man with a wonderful wife. Um, and we, we live very happily down here. So that's

Rob Valincius: well,

Bernard "Chalky" White: in a nutshell, really.

Rob Valincius: so before we rewind, 'cause I definitely wanna hit on a couple things, um, gotta ask, uh, you were, you know, obviously you were a ski instructor, you were really into, you know, snow and cold. What was the, uh, the, the, the choice of going to the Caribbean instead of somewhere where you, well, I guess, I don't know if you're still skiing or not because I know there's, there's gotta be some sort of a point where limbs don't function as well.

Look, I'm turning 40 and shit's haywire, so.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Well, I'm, I'm pretty much twice, twice your age. Um, but we, we came here, uh, mostly on a full-time basis, um, because my wife unfortunately has Parkinson's disease and she does much, she does much better in warm weather where she get, her joints get very, very stiff and stuff in the cold weather. So we just got up and, you know, we had a house in Colorado.

We sold that, and then we came, we came down here and we bought this, this lovely place we live in now. So we live in this, uh, really nice condo in, um, literally seven minutes from the beach. I live actually about 20 yards, uh, to my left, um, is a marina with all kinds of sailboats and motorboats and all that stuff.

You know,

Rob Valincius: That's awesome. Look, I love the Caribbean, me and the, the wifey. Um, you know, up until maybe two or three years ago, we would go to Punta Kana, uh, basically now, like during, like right around Christmas time.

Bernard "Chalky" White: where,

Rob Valincius: It's, it's in the Caribbean, uh, the Dominican Republic.

Bernard "Chalky" White: okay, I know Dominican.

Rob Valincius: Um, and a, I mean, we would go to an all-inclusive, you know, six, seven days. It was, you know, not crazy expensive. And it was just a, a cool way to just hang out. And it's 80, 85 degrees when here it's snowing and, you know, it's cold and, uh, it's just a, it throws you off.

'cause obviously I'm, I'm born, we're born here in the Northeast, so you're just accustomed to December weather being cold and snowy and not fun. And it throws you for a loop when you're on a beach and, you know, you're in your, your swim trunks and it's December 20th. You know, it's, it's a weird phenomenon.

Bernard "Chalky" White: See, and also literally right outside my back door off of my deck, I take two, one step, two steps, and I'm in a 25 meter, um, lap pool, which I use to, to stay fit, to help me stay fit. Yeah. So, you know, have I got anything to complain about? Absolutely not.

Rob Valincius: Swimming is, I'm, I'm, uh, I've always been a, a swimmer. I love, you know, just the water. I'm not a big fan of the ocean. I like swimming in, like, I'm rather swimming in a pool, um, because I don't have to worry about something biting me, you know?

Bernard "Chalky" White: Right.

Rob Valincius: um, I, you know, growing up I would live, like my grandmom had a pool.

I would live in the pool during the summer. It was, I couldn't get me out and to, you know, we go to Punta Kana, it was the same thing. I, I would be in the pool and it would be tough to get me out of the pool. Uh, but I can see how that, from a fitness perspective too, it's just keeps you, keeps you limber and you know you're not gonna hurt anything. Uh, 'cause it's not, not a hard contact

Bernard "Chalky" White: Yeah. Yeah, that's right.

Rob Valincius: Um. But let's rewind. Uh, you know, you had mentioned as we were talking, and I, you know, that I thought it was pretty cool, but you saved a baby. You got, you gotta tell the, tell us the story about the baby.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Well, yeah. Okay. It's, um, maybe I, maybe I, I should.

It was when I was still in the Kent Police where I first joined the police. And um, I was the passenger in, uh, an emergency car. You know where in America you dial 9 1 1 and we'd be the car that go in England actually is 9, 9 9. They use. Anyway, this call comes out and I'm the radio operator and my friend who's, well my colleague, who was a good 20 years older than me, was a family man and stuff.

And I was still kind of only 20, I was only 20 years old. And this call comes out. Sounds of a dying cat. Now, the police actually have no responsibility for cats whatsoever. They do for dogs because for a dog and if, if for, if you're in, for example, you hit a cat in a car or something, you don't have to tell the police about that.

But if you hit a dog, you have to report that. 'cause dogs, all dogs in the, in the UK have to be licensed. You have to have a license to have a dog. So anyway. We decided, we take the call and we just very clo very slowly, we mosey on out there. It was kind of almost out into the country. And we get to this, this, this, uh, house.

It was a row house or terrorist house we call 'em in England. And we, we went all the way through the house out into the backyard and there's some bushes and the man said, under the bush, you sound, he's a Siamese cat. So I'm out there and for some reason, the driver, my driver didn't, so didn't come straight away.

Um, and I got, got underneath the bush and I shown my Sean, my flashlight, and I shun it all over and I didn't see anything. And so I came out, I said, well, I don't see anything, and maybe it's gone, you know. So anyway, my, my partner, the driver comes and he's got a big C and search, uh, flashlight. Really, really big, powerful one.

I go back in there again and I, and I shone it. I went hospital, it's a baby. And I grabbed, grabbed this baby and it still had the umbilical cord and the placenta attached, and we managed to wrap it in a jacket. And we got into the car. And my, my partner was a, a, a a family man. So he, he took the baby and I drove as fast as I could back through, uh, what was a place called Rochester, which at that, uh, by the way is, was the home of Charles Dickens.

That's where he first came from. Um, and, and got him to, to, to bath use hospital. And this is the middle of August. So it, it's actually fairly warm for England and the other hospital. They said, luckily you found this baby when you did. They said, because another few minutes, or maximum an hour, it would probably have died of exposure.

Um, so that baby, as far as I know that, and, and it is funny, but I, I never, I kept up with that baby for a little while to see what was happening with it. And it, it survived just fine. I can't even remember what the sex was anymore. Um, but it lived, if, if that baby had lived it would be

60 years old, almost now. 58 years old. 'cause that was 1967 when that happened. Yeah.

Rob Valincius: That is wild. So did you guys ever find

Bernard "Chalky" White: In my life. Really? In one way. Yeah.

Rob Valincius: did you guys ever find out like whose baby it was

Bernard "Chalky" White: Yeah. Well, that's the other part of the story. Yeah. So anyway, we, we were on night shift, so we kind of finished work at kind of six, seven o'clock in the morning. But the, the, the, the criminal investigation department, the detectives went out there. And, um, they went out into the backyard and they see this trailer blood and the trailer blood led all the way down the garden.

And there was an alleyway running down the back, which separated one set of houses from the other. The blood went all the way down the alley, all the way around the side of the end house, all out the front, all the way out the front, uh, garden path. And they banged on the door and a, a man comes to the door and they said, what do you know about that blood going up your staircase?

And the guy sort of shrugged his shoulders. So up they go and they go into this room and there's this 14-year-old girl, this man's daughter, uh, and she'd literally given birth to this baby on her own and then gone and dumped it. Didn't know what to do. Right. Um, and the father was a, a 16-year-old. Um. And she, she would probably have been charged, I can't remember now, but she would've been charged with child abandonment.

Now, if the baby had died, she'd have probably been charged, charged with something a lot worse, probably manslaughter. And the, the boy was charged with having unlawful sexual intercourse with a, with a, with a juvenile. And, um, and the baby would've been adopted somewhere. I'd gone in, probably went into a foster home, first would've been adopted, and it would've been, well, it could've, that child could be a grandparent easily by now.

Yeah. That was the greatest thing that ever happened to me when I was a cop. Well, probably in one way, greatest thing in my life. Really. Yeah. So it has, it can have its rewards being a cop, but as, as you know, as a cop, you being a policeman, what I found out was when no one else wants to deal with something.

The police have to deal with it. Certainly over there. They did for sure. And of course we didn't carry guns or anything, so as I said, you know, this was my gun. That was it. Yeah.

Rob Valincius: That's, that's crazy to think. And, and you know, you said you saw someone disempowered, I mean, is did you see a lot of, I mean, obviously

Bernard "Chalky" White: I didn't see it. I got there after they'd done it.

Rob Valincius: Okay,

Bernard "Chalky" White: Yeah.

Rob Valincius: what was, what was that like? That's gotta be pretty. as a human to see that.

Bernard "Chalky" White: I mean, do you want me to tell that story?

Rob Valincius: Yeah. Hit me

Bernard "Chalky" White: Yeah. Um, again, this is in Chatham Place called Chatham in Kent, Chatham's famous for you might have, you might have heard of Nelson and, and Nelson's column in Trafalgar Square, Lord Nelson in Inga Square in London, um, Nelson,

Rob Valincius: Yeah.

Bernard "Chalky" White: which in the battle French, um.

Ship the victory in Chatham in where I worked. That's what, it's one of the things. It's, um, anyway, this is nine in the morning. I early shift. I've been working since six and I'm just gonna into police station yard in car and comes out, go to 64 for Pitt Street, Chatham and attempted suicide. So, okay. And they said, and they said ambulance crew is already on the scene.

So I went up there and it's in a big block of apartments and I'm starting to walk in to go upstairs. There was no, there was no elevator and there's two guys carrying a stretch down. The man didn't, well said, what's the story with him? I couldn't believe. Put, I put the stretcher down. They said, don't worry about him.

Come with us. So I'm follow him up the stairs. We turn right top of the stairs, then turn right into this apartment. We go into the kitchen. Now the different, what made this a, a a little different was at a lower level and an upper level, which is pretty unusual in, in apartments, right? So anyway, we go into the door and we turn right into the kitchen.

And I see over the sink area is a black drape with a couple of candles on it. And on the floor is a red hospital blanket with a pair of feet sticking out of the end. And one of these ambulance guys said, he said, you're not gonna like this. He said, but I've gotta show you. He pulls back, he pulls back the blanket, and there's this.

I found out 12-year-old girl laying there with her intestines, literally laying on the floor beside her. Anyway, the, the ambulance guys left and I'm left there alone and I had my, I had a radio with me. Uh, they were kinda steam radios back then were about this big, you know, because it was just way, way back in again.

This again is like 19 67, 19 68 actually it was that. Um, and I called for help and then, you know, then half the police detectives in Kent came and running. Anyway, while I'm waiting for them to come, there's a woman sitting in the front room, and this is nine o'clock in the morning. She's sitting there drinking a glass of scotch whisking.

I said, um, what do you know about that in the kitchen? And she just shrugged her shoulders. And I said. You are under arrest on suspicion of murder. And anyway, the detectives came, um, I was kind of almost sum, dis dismissed 'cause I was kind of very junior, you know. And, um, anyway, the woman was arrested, taken to the police station and, and charged with murder of this girl.

Now, the man on the stretcher was the woman's wife, and he was the, he was the janitor, the caretaker of the block of apartments. And what they'd done was the two of them, between them, they started taking all kinds of photographs of this young girl every day. She walked past, she lived on the same, same balcony, the same landing as they did.

And every day they, and all kinds of photographs were taken, were found of this girl in the apartment. And they decided. For black magic purposes that they would sacrifice a virgin to, to Satan or whoever. And, um, you know this, on this, on this one, they'd already sent, by the way, 'cause they were probably part of their black magic cove.

They'd already sent their own two children to school. And as this girl's walking by, um, the woman goes out and she says to, says to the girl, would you come in for a moment? I want to give you a letter to mail for me. Right? So the girl follow follows the woman in Anyway, hiding behind the front door is the, is the guy that was on the stretcher.

And he, he grabs her. And so stop her screaming. He pushes her handkerchief into her mouth so she can't scream. I drag her into the kitchen, put her on the floor, undress her, tie her hands behind her back, and her feet together. And he then gets. A cutthroat razor and cutter from the, the, the, the top of the pubis to the bottom of the sternum, the, the breastbone and pull literally pulled all the muscle back.

And then he gets, and, and I actually went to the, the postmortem to the autopsy for this, for this girl. And he, the pathologist, said that even at that time, this girl could have still been conscious and could have felt all of this going on. Anyway, this, this guy, after he cut her open, he then gets his, literally gets his bare hands in underneath all her intestines and just yank them out.

And then he gets a big carving knife and pushes it up through her heart to kill her. Yeah. So anyway, as I said, the, the man, the guy who was on the stretcher that the, the, the guy was the main guy did the murdering, uh, was taken to the hospital. And, um, a friend of mine, a friend of mine, detective, I won't mention names here, um, he's dead now.

Anyway, um, he was sent to the hospital and he said, you know, where, where's this man? So they said he's down there in the operating. So he goes down there, he is waiting outside and he thought, he thought, screw this, I'm going in. So he goes in and he tells the surgeon and everybody else that's in there with him trying to stitch this guy up.

Um, oh, I forgot to tell you this. He, what he did after, because I forgot this part, excuse me. What happened was when they're halfway through him doing this, they'd forgotten to lock the front door when they're murdering this girl and one of their children's grandparents met a man walked in and caught them doing it, and he was the one who dialed nine 11 for everybody to come.

So the man. Who'd done the murder, done. The main guy doing the murdering went upstairs and sat in his bathtub and with the same cut throat, razor cut, he slit his, his wrist and his femoral arteries. And that's why he was taken to the hospital. Anyway. So my, my buddy's in the operating theater, and they, and he said, said he announced, do you know what that guy's done?

So he told them and the operating theaters went, everybody left and he died.

Rob Valincius: Wow.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Um, a woman was initially charged with murder. She went to what was known then as the Ken Sizes. Now I'll call him Crown Court. It's one of the big, you know, a ma, a major, uh, court of law. And her counsel stands up and he says, my, my client will plead not guilty to murder.

Which means, um, murder is defined certainly in the UK as um, having malice a forethought, right? But she'll plead, uh, guilty to manslaughter, which means there's no malice involved. I mean, how could there not be any malice in what she did? She knew. She stood there, watched the whole thing, encouraged the girl into the house, the whole nine yards,

Rob Valincius: Yeah.

Bernard "Chalky" White: this is the worst.

She got three years a manslaughter. And in two years of good behavior, the girl's father threatened to kill her when she came out, as far as I know, he never carried out the threat. Um, yeah, so that was, so I went from the best story that ever happened to me when I was a cop to the worst story that happened.

Yeah.

Rob Valincius: that's crazy. I, and mean, I guess there had to be a lot of, some pretty crazy shit went down in like the sixties, seventies, because. People were, it's not like, I don't know if it's like today. I mean, I'm sure there's some crazy stuff that happens today that, you know, people look at. They're like, what just happened?

Bernard "Chalky" White: there was no internet or any of that back then. Um, so a lot of these kind of modern crimes you get on the internet and stuff today, you didn't get back then so much. You know, obviously because, because you couldn't, didn't exist. Yeah. Um, so yeah, that was, that was, uh, definitely the worst thing that ever happened to me as a, as a cop.

And it's something that's never left my mind, you know, to, to, to, to see that. Yeah.

Rob Valincius: I can imagine. I mean, it would be hard. I mean, I ran over a squirrel. it, I still feel bad about it, and that was 20 years ago. I'm a normal person, right? I mean, that's you as a human. You respect life, whether it's a squirrel, uh, especially if it's a human, right? Um, so that's, people like that. I mean, they deserve, they deserve what they get.

They deserve what's coming to 'em. And I, I don't have any respect, uh, for somebody, especially a 12-year-old girl that's, it's sad, you know, they have their whole life to live. But, um, look, let's move on to, to, to the fun stuff, right? Let's get away from the grim. But I always like talking about that because right, that defined you, um, to a certain point, right?

Some of the best moment of your, your life as, especially as a cop and the worst moment of your life as a cop. But two instances, you know, could have had a profound impact on you as a person. Um, you talked a lot about your, your test,

Bernard "Chalky" White: before you go on, I mean, what it did that, that, that witnessing that murder and the injustice of that, that murder, um, because I've called the title of, of, of that story in the book is, is Justice Not Done? Not Even Close. And that really, really affected me. That's what, even more so, persuaded me if you're gonna get justice like that.

I don't wanna be a cop anymore. You know, that was one of the things that helped drive me out. So, yeah. Um, anyway, excuse me, sorry Rob.

Rob Valincius: No, you're good. Um, you know, you talked a lot about, um, you know, obviously you had someone tell you, Hey, because of your body type, you're never gonna be a ski instructor. Um, you know, you failed to test a bunch. Um, what made you. Keep going. you know, a lot of people in your scenario, they fail eight times or whatever.

They would just stop. And especially in today's world, I mean, you know, I've talked about this a lot. I think, I think our world today is really soft. Uh, and people just give up because that's just what they've been It's, it's okay to give up. I, I'm still, I consider myself part of an older generation where, you know, there there was winners and losers and, you know, you should always try to do better.

And you know, my dad, I talk to him every day and he says to me, he's like, you got a great life, man. Like, you know? Yeah. And I'm like, he's like, you know what, what do you have to complain about? I'm like, I'm not complaining, I can always be better myself. I can always do better. Yeah. And, uh, but, but what made you keep going? You know, I know you talked about your questions and everything, but internally I think that's, that's, some people, that is a, a difficult. Um, emotional response that sometimes people can't handle rejection that many times

Bernard "Chalky" White: Because I've long thought if it's, if it's something that's so, so important to you, quitting is not an option. Provided what you're trying to achieve is possible. Now, if you're saying, I'm gonna try and fly a kite to the moon opposite, obviously you're not gonna be able to do that. But

Rob Valincius: might be a little mad.

Bernard "Chalky" White: trying to become a ski, I mean, I, I passed the first two levels, although it took me some time to pass those first two levels.

I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you now had I not passed that top exam eventually. Um, so. I often wondered what I'd have done had I failed when I went to New Zealand. Um, I would've probably gone back and, and tried again. But, but I mean, even that, I went down to New Zealand because I'd heard they let you, let, let foreigners take their full certification.

But I went to the first, um, training class, first, uh, training class for people trying to get the full certification. And I go there for the first one and the trainer gets, gets to me and he said, um, what are you doing here? I said, um, I'm, I wanna try and take your full certification. He said, you can't. I said, why not?

He said, because you haven't got our first qualification. 'cause in, in Britain there was three levels, but in New Zealand there was two right at the time. And um, so I went away and I thought, wow, what am I gonna do? So what I decided was that I would stay. And do what he said and say, okay, I'm gonna try it and get, I'll get their first qualification and then maybe next year, another year, again, I can take their full certification.

But what I did in the meantime was I kept going to this guy's classes. I kept shy and what I would do, maybe it's a little brown nosing here, I don't know. I would show up first, try to be seen to work the hardest and leave last, right? And I kept doing this and I went,

Rob Valincius: You know, there's a new thing that that happens every time you do shit in life. But, uh, that was weird. Anyway, uh, I don't even know where you're in the middle of talking about.

Bernard "Chalky" White: oh yeah, but talk, talking about, you know, me, me going, this guy, this trainer, saying to me, you've got, you've gotta, you've gotta take our first qualification first before you can take the fuller. So I decided to stay and try and do that. In the meantime, I kept going back to this trainer's full certification class.

And as I, as I said before, maybe you could call it a little bit of brown nosing, I dunno. But I, but I, I, um, I would be seen to, to always show up first, always try to be seen to work the hardest when, during, during the session and leave last. And I kept doing it and doing it and doing it went back maybe 4, 5, 6, even, maybe seven times.

And eventually his trainer came to me and he said, you really wanna do this, don't you? I said, yeah, I do. He said, I'm gonna let you. And he let me. And, and, and this is now my eighth attempt at trying to become a full certified ski instructor, you know, including the first two levels. And I personally passed their level the first time, and I've still, that was 1984.

And I still use that qualification today. And without it, without that qualification, it would've really restricted me as to where I could work. And back then, uh, unless you had a full certification as a foreigner, you couldn't work in the United States. So that's that the qualification that got me into the United States.

So, um, again, it all goes back to if it, if it's that important to you, you can't, you just cannot, cannot quit. What if I don't keep going and keep trying this? What will be the repercussions of me for me? I won't, I won't be able. I just won't achieve what I want to achieve. And if I don't keep going, I will regret this for the rest of my life.

And boy, do I despise that word. I despise that word regret. It's a terrible emotion, you know? Um,

Rob Valincius: great questions to ask yourself. Um, I think everybody in, in many of the things that they do

Bernard "Chalky" White: I mean, what, what if of course is as old as the hills, right? The question what if, but it's the way, it's the way using the, and the simplicity of it. And you can do it any moment in time, anywhere. You know, what if I don't, what if I do? And, and, and that change of emotion from asking one set of negative questions to another set of asking positive questions, that emotion change is what sends you on your way.

That's, that was how I got out of the police force after procrastinating for years and years. And without, if I hadn't have asked those questions back then, I wouldn't, I never would've gotten to talk to you. I'm sure. Yeah.

Rob Valincius: you wrote two books. Let's, let's talk a little bit about that before we wind down. Right. Um, know, we talked a little bit about, of everything, and, and honestly, I think your, your two questions why your, your main book now, right. Um, is kind of been a, the basis of our whole conversation. Um, but what's your writing process like?

Obviously you did this, you know, when was your most recent book written?

Bernard "Chalky" White: Well, it took, it took me about four years.

Rob Valincius: Hey, look, know, a Rome wasn't built in a day right.

Bernard "Chalky" White: I mean, the ski book took me about four years as well. Um, because part with the ski book, just very briefly with the ski book, it was, it took me a long time because, you know, during the winter I'd be, you know, from, from morning to night I'd be talking to people about skiing and I didn't wanna get home from work and then sit down and start writing about skiing unless I had some sort of big inspiration that happened to me, you know?

Um, so that's why that took me a pretty long time. But, but you know, he is trying to come up with, with the right storage, you know, for the, for the Keep chewing, the Granite Book. Um, stories that I thought people would be really interested in and just, I suppose a little bit of procrastination. I'd sort of, I'd start to write and then I'd put it down for a little while and then I'd go, okay, I'm gonna write a bit more today and then I'll write another chapter, and so on and so forth.

Um, but in the end it got done and, and somebody, and then somebody one day said to me, well, you know, why don't you try to turn this book into some kind of motivational, inspirational thing? And that's, that's why I decided to then include my, what if I don't, what if I, what if I do questions? Yeah. So that the book could, apart from having hopefully some, some funny, some sad, some inspirational stories also also had a, a, a section of it where they could really use it as a tool, um, to try and achieve their own dreams and aspirations.

Rob Valincius: Now. Well, for one, I always like to support people I have on my show. So just to let you know, I bought your book. I'm an audio book guy, so I, I bought, I bought the audio book version. I drive a lot. So, uh, you know, I try, but, um, I like as creatives, man, I, I, I appreciate you putting down your experiences, you know, uh, on paper and, and also having, uh, to talk about it, whether it's yourself or someone else, you know, with the audio book.

And, um, it's tough, man. How did you feel, uh, and, you know, for, for your, for your newest book, right? Uh, you know, which evolves with two questions. Have you gotten some positive response and what has been your, your reviews like, uh, from, from other people and their experiences?

Bernard "Chalky" White: Well as you've, um, as you've now, uh, bought the book, and thank you very much for that. Perhaps you might, might be kind enough to go amazon com. Write a review for me, please. Just doesn't have to be very long.

Rob Valincius: do that for you.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Um,

Rob Valincius: loves reviews,

Bernard "Chalky" White: and of course, you know, um, I'd like to write a review about this, this interview as well. That would be, I'd like to be able to do that too. That'd be terrific. I, I'm, I'm really enjoying this, by the way. Thank you very much. Yeah. Sorry, what was your, what was that last question again? Excuse me.

Rob Valincius: Uh, I was saying, how, what was the, the response been for you for, from your readers, for the newest book?

Bernard "Chalky" White: Um, very positive. I mean, all the reviews so far on Amazon, um, are five star reviews, which is the maximums, which I'm obviously very pleased about, you know. Um, but the more, the more you can get on there, I mean, the problem is with a book, especially when you self-publish it as I did, um, is there are something like 14 million books on Amazon.

How do you get yours to stand out? You know? So that's, I mean, that's obviously part of the reason why I wanna do podcasts like yours. Um, because to try to try and conjure up some publicity and, and let people know about it, you know, because it's, it's like anything else. If, if you, um, if nobody knows about it, nobody's ever gonna see it.

Are they? I mean, it's as simple as that.

Rob Valincius: The Internet's a hell of a place, you know, um, you can find a lot of stuff that you don't want. Um, and, uh, I think the kids now call it, and I can't believe I'm saying that, you know, I used to make fun of my dad when he would say shit. And now I'm saying stuff that I'm like, ah, those kids, you know? Uh, but it's called Brain Rott, you know, a lot of this stuff.

Now it's just, there's no. Thought there's no, um, intelligence behind a lot of this stuff, right. And, uh, you know, you gotta really appreciate, um, someone especially, and I've interviewed a bunch of authors on my show and people that have put some very intimate things in books that they've written themselves and even, even, um, autobiographies and things, they've, they've, um, you know, spoke about themselves.

They, they were their own narrator, right? So, um, you gotta appreciate someone that can do that. Um, you know, and you've got a lot of experience and I feel like something like that, I mean, I was just going through, uh, some of the reviews of your book and it's, you know, life stories with lessons, sounds of a dying cat, throttling, bananas, knife point.

I mean, just, you know, everyone, it's just, it's all positive and, um, you know, you gotta appreciate someone that can take their experiences in life, put in a book in a meaningful way where it can potentially help people.

Bernard "Chalky" White: And also I, I mean I, I just enjoy also the act of writing. I enjoy writing and playing with words on paper, you know, always, you know, I didn't realize I liked that so much until, you know, until the last few years. But I really enjoy writing like the ski book. I really enjoyed writing that, you know, and, um, trying to come up with a, you know, a theme for that to, to, um, really interest.

And that's what the Seven Secrets are all about, you know, because they're not secrets at all. Of course, they're, but they're, they're steps, steps to, to how you can really develop into as good a skier as you, you might want to be, you know? Um, so, you know, I really enjoyed that do doing that, you know, that was a lot of fun.

And even, even that book, um, there was a naysayer in there as well. Um, do you want me to tell you that story real, really fast?

Rob Valincius: Yeah, go ahead.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Um, after I've written the manuscript, I've got the manuscript and, um, my friend, um, Matt Dean, good, very good friend of mine who I, I've skied with a lot and I used him as my sounding board.

Every time I would write something, I would pass it through him and say, what do you think of this? And pretty much every time he would come back and say, no, he said, you are. I think that's very accurate what you've written there, right? So anyway, I, I've written the manuscript and I go and see my then ski school director in Beaver Creek, and I said to him, um, I said, can I use two or three of your ski instructors?

I said, for photographic purposes, for my ski book, photographic demonstration purposes. He said, yeah. He said, uh, that, that, that, that sounds like a really good idea, but you can't be in them. I said, why's that? He said, because you don't ski well enough, so. At that, at that moment, I felt like throwing the manuscript out of the window, you know, and I've written the book and I'm supposedly not, not supposed to be in the demonstration photographs.

So anyway, I, I tell my, uh, my good friend Matt deem I just spoke about, about this, and he said, that is absolute rubbish. He said, that's just not true. And he said, you are as good a skier as just about anybody in the ski school. He said, you've gotta publish this book. So that's when I asked myself, what if I don't?

And what if I do? And the answers I got from what if I don't were, uh, well, if I don't, I've just wasted four years writing this thing, you know? And if I don't publish it and give it to the people that really I think could use the information, I'll regret it forever, you know, not doing that. So anyway, I decided to go ahead, right?

And I found my own three demonstrators other than myself. I was de determined to be in it 'cause I'd written the book, so why shouldn't I be in the photographs? Right.

Rob Valincius: Yeah. F that right.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Anyway, all three of the demonstrators that I found were, were friends of mine, but all three were world champion synchronized skiing cha uh, world synchronized skiing champions. In other words, they were fantastic demonstrators. So we did the photographic shoot and the lady that, the lady that that did the, the photographic shoot was also a ski instructor examiner, but she didn't know anything about this conversation I'd had with the ski school director.

And she said, you know, your demonstrations were just as good as the other three. And in fact, the way you hold your arms and your and hands when you ski is better than the other three. I went, right, that's it. And I published it. And there's a story of, as well, of course, behind the title because all the time I'm writing this book.

I, I, I had no, um, idea of what I, I was gonna call it. I thought all the time was right. I thought, I'm gonna come up with a title of this very soon. He's gonna come to me. It's gonna, but he never did. Well, he kind of did. Anyway, I'm in Aspen and I'm skiing with, well, the guy that wrote the Forward, I don't know if you read, read the Forward word in that book, uh, in the book was, is Howard Lunik, who, who was the man who was in charge of Cantor Fitzgerald, the, the, the company that lost the most people in the nine 11 attacks.

And he became my, um, ski client for 12 years. Anyway, I'm on a ski lift with him and a friend of his, and I'll tell him about this, the book I'd written and all that stuff. And, uh, and one of them, the, the guy who's Howard Lu's friend, he said, what are you gonna call the book? I said, I've thought about calling it skiing and the power of balance.

And his words were. That is so bleeping boring. I said, well, if you can come up with something better, I said, I'm all ears. So anyway, a couple of days goes by, go by and I'm on the chairlift with him, with these two guys again. And this guy said, I've got a title for you. I said, what? He said, the Seven Secrets of Skiing.

I said, I can't call it that. He said, why not? He said, you've got seven steps, haven't you? He said, give it a little bit of intrigue. You know, people are gonna be intrigued by that title. Seven Secrets of Skiing. Well, okay. He said, are you famous? I said, well, only in my own mind. Um, he said, he said, well, why don't you then call it?

Because then people think you are famous. Call it Chalky Whites, the seven Secrets of Skiing. And that's what I ended up calling it. And that book in its category on Amazon went to, went to number one. And it's, that sold a lot, a lot for a ski book that sold a lot of copies. Yeah. So I was very obviously very pleased with that.

Yeah. Yeah.

Rob Valincius: man. That is awesome. to end with, listen, uh, chalky, it's been a pleasure having you on. Um,

Bernard "Chalky" White: Thank you, sir.

Rob Valincius: where they can find all of your stuff.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Oh, you can find both, both the books, especially the, um, especially the, the Keep Chewing, the Granite Book, my motivational memoir. Can find it on, on amazon.com. Uh, just to go to amazon.com and punch in, keep chewing the granite and if people want to get in touch with me or the other part of it I haven't mentioned is, um, I want to start trying to do more motivational speaking if I can because I, I have a motivational speech, which, which revolves around a lot of this stuff, which I've called how to Say Nay to your naysayers and have the last laugh.

Um, so if people want to contact me, they can on my, my email address, which is chalky go@gmail.com. I'll spell it phonetically for you. C Charlie h Hotel a Alpha L Mackey, OY, Yankee G, golf o, Oscar chalky. go@gmail.com. If people want to contact me that way, they're more than welcome to and I'd love to hear from them if they want hear about the book or either of the books or anything else.

I just want to chat about different things to do with what I do. Um, I'd be very glad to hear from, thank you.

Rob Valincius: Awesome. Well look, it was such a pleasure. Uh, my podcast is drinkoclockpod on all socials. Drink o’clock podcast, wherever you listen to podcasts. The website is drinkoclock.beer. Super, super easy. Super, uh, simple to remember. Um, and we'll have this up soon. And, uh, look man, keep doing what you're doing and uh, you know, I appreciate this.

Thank you.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Are we still on air?

Rob Valincius: We are,

Bernard "Chalky" White: Oh, we are. Okay.

Rob Valincius: thanks Chalky.

Bernard "Chalky" White: No, I, I really appreciate it. And, uh, let me know, I'd like to, like to, I've really enjoyed this interview. I'd like to, to put a, a, a, uh, review on Pod match or wherever for you as well. It'd be, be wonderful and, uh, thank you very much again, and hopefully we'll get to speak again sometime. Thank you.

Rob Valincius: Appreciate you.

Bernard "Chalky" White: Uh, you too. 

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