I am Haunted: Living Life Through the Dead (26 page)

A documentary filmmaker also needs to have a great memory. With a regular movie that follows a script, you know exactly what you have to shoot and how you’re going to piece it all together. A documentary could take one, two, or five years to film and involve hundred or even thousands of hours of footage. That makes it hard to figure out where to start when it’s time to put it together. A lot of documentary films fail because the filmmaker doesn’t have the memory (or filing system) to know where certain bits and pieces of footage are. You have to log everything you’ve shot and remember it all. You have to be organized, because when it comes time for editing, you have to go back through all those of hours of footage and put it together into a smooth, compelling story. This is where some people quit. A lot of documentary filmmakers get lost in the editing and can’t remember what they shot or where to start or how to connect all the pieces.

You also have to be a writer. A documentary filmmaker writes the narrations that lead the audience from one puzzle piece to the next (called transitions). During the filming of
Netherworld,
I did a lot of moody writing that supported how I wanted the overall visual presentation to come off.
Netherworld
was artistic, with abstract visuals and hints of electronic music, so the moody writing was perfect for it. (Flip back to chapter 13 for more on that adventure.)

A great documentary filmmaker has to put together a great crew and be a great leader for that crew. You have to know what you want from them, be strict and organized, and know how to bring out their best. And speaking of people, you can’t let anything or anyone affect your creativity or color your vision for the film. A strong filmmaker doesn’t compromise his standards or let other people run the show. A weak person may not be able to handle a certain shoot or a particular person, so he ends up being more lenient on the production itself. This is not and never will be me or the people I work with. I make sure to bring in only the most professional and dedicated people who understand my vision for a project, which has been a big part of my success.

You have to make sure that everything you shoot—every interview, every piece of B-roll footage—follows your direction and is in line with your creative vision. You can’t let anyone mess with that. A documentary is a hunt to find the end of your story. It’s a mission, and you can never let go of it or give up on it. If you do, you can give away your title as a documentary filmmaker. You’ve lost your dignity and let yourself down.

No matter what the circumstances, a great filmmaker finds a way to get it done. If you run into financial problems or some other major hurdle, you can’t give up.
Ghost Adventures
(the film) was shot on a shoestring budget, but I never let that interfere with the storytelling. You have to be
Braveheart
about it and fight for your freedom. Ironically, though, I don’t recommend documentary filmmaking as a career. It’s not easy, and in some cases you put your life on the line to carry out your vision.

IT’S A TOUGH BUSINESS THAT EATS ITS YOUNG.

Women are hard enough to handle without their ghosts, too.

Some guys say, “All my exes live in Texas.” For me, all my exes get haunted and freaked out by evil spirits. It’s the nature of dating me. Over a period of two years, every girl I dated was affected by the spirit attachments I had during that time. I couldn’t help it. Every time I came back from an investigation, I seemed to bring back baggage that would attack whoever I was dating. It was awful. Over those two years, I’d say twelve women were affected in some way, and half of them experienced severe attacks. Dealing with women is hard enough. Demons make it nearly impossible.

A spiritual healer from Hungary told me that I had a possessive female spirit following me around and a demonic attachment. I don’t doubt it. In fact, two separate healers came up with this same diagnosis, and neither one knew the other, so I believe it. It made sense to me, so for a while I had all the women I dated sign waivers so I wouldn’t be responsible for anything that happened to them.

I’m joking.

When the attacks died down, I thought it was over. In the past year I haven’t had any paranormal activity at my house, which is a big relief since before then, every woman was getting attacked in some way when she came over. But recently, an ex-girlfriend called me out of the blue to tell me that she was having severe experiences with a spirit at home. Two weeks later, another woman said the same thing. No, there’s no way they could have collaborated on this. They don’t know about each other, have never met, and live in different states.

Coincidence? C’mon. Look who we’re talking about here.

The first girlfriend (we’ll call her Ms. Blue) had a serious problem, and I had to go to her apartment because things were getting so bad. I hadn’t seen her in a long time, so yeah, it was awkward, but I wanted to help. So I went over one night to see what was going on. Apparently a spirit was attacking her and her roommate. It also damaged the apartment itself, tearing down the blinds, raising the washing machine lid, turning lights on and off, and opening and closing doors, and taunted Ms. Blue while she was sleeping. As soon as I walked into the apartment, I could feel that something wasn’t right. The air was heavy, and we definitely weren’t alone.

I’ve done this job for many years now, and I’ve conducted hundreds of interviews with people who have been traumatized by spirits. Ms. Blue and her roommate were legitimately freaked out and concerned for their well-being (it wasn’t a booty call, for those of you who may be wondering). So I walked in, sat down on the couch, started talking to them, and immediately felt uneasy.

It was worse upstairs in the bedrooms. I couldn’t even stay in Ms. Blue’s room because something unfriendly was there, pushing me out like it knew I could sense it and fight it. It wasn’t as strong in her roommate’s room, but it was still there, so we went downstairs to talk. That’s when things got worse.

I’m a sensitive and an empath and can channel the emotions of the spirits around me, and this one was angry. Really angry. Within seconds I was aggravated and wanted to do the women harm, and I knew that the negative energy wasn’t coming from me. Something was trying to make me feel its rage. Luckily I recognized what was going on and got out before I could cause any trouble. Outside the apartment, I told them that something was in there and it wasn’t good, and they needed to leave before it affected them permanently. I had gone over there just to reassure them that everything was okay, but I was unprepared for what I found.

The thing is, after I dated Ms. Blue, she had a bad relationship with a man who got her into trouble. He was a bad influence and almost destroyed her life—the kind of guy you wouldn’t want around your daughter, like Mark Wahlberg’s character in the movie
Fear.
About six months before the night I went to her apartment to see what was going on, he was shot and killed, so my first thought was that this spirit was him coming back to dominate her from the other side. He seemed like a usual suspect, and that’s who you always start with.

But then two weeks later, another ex-girlfriend (we’ll call her Ms. Green) texted me with almost the
exact
same story. It matched Ms. Blue’s nearly word for word—damaged blinds, doors opening and closing, lights turning on and off, the works. Did I think it was a conspiracy? Sure. But trust me, there’s no way these women could have cooked up this story between them, especially since I felt the spirit at Ms. Blue’s apartment and knew she wasn’t faking it. They don’t even know each other. So how was it that they were having the same issues?

And then it hit me. Could the same spirit have moved from Ms. Blue’s apartment to Ms. Green’s? Did the attachment travel from one place to the other? Remember what I said about the possessive female spirit that attacked women in my house? Hell hath no fury like a jealous woman, right? Could it be that this malevolent spirit remembered them from when they would come to my house and was trying to terrorize them both? Could it be that it was trying to feed off their fear and knew that it could manipulate me by getting me involved? It’s like a funky triangle of jealousy. It’s the worst kind of love triangle you can imagine—one with a demon chick involved…literally. She’s baaaaaaaaaack.

Fortunately, the attacks have subsided (at the time this book is being published, at least). Sometimes hauntings last a long time, and sometimes they last only a short while and then go away: The entity gets what it wants and then leaves the victim(s) alone. I didn’t really do anything to stop them, but the attacks ended, which is fine by me. But let this be a warning to any woman who wants to date me. I’m not a stalker, but some sort of bitchy spirit watching over me is.

GEORGE STRAIT’S EXES MAY LIVE IN TEXAS,
BUT MINE GET POSSESSED.

Some of you scare me.

I have a dungeon that has become my refuge, and many days I just want to stay there. We all need a safe harbor where we can get away from everything and feel secure. Since I am a fan of Dracula and the dark bits of life, it was only fitting for me to remodel my basement into a dungeon when I had some extra money. It’s me, and it’s the one place I can retreat to when I’ve had enough of everything—especially people who have no boundaries.

I was filming an episode of
Paranormal Challenge
at the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum in West Virginia when Dave Schrader, Chris Fleming, and I decided to get something to eat at McDonald’s. (Don’t judge me.) It was evening, and we were done filming for the day. Since Weston, West Virginia, is a small town, we figured we would sit inside and eat. What could happen, right?

As we strode across the parking lot, I noticed one of those old child molester vans in the back of the lot. It looked like the A-Team van from the early 1980s, except this one had no windows, so I was a little on edge with each step—and with good reason, it turned out. When we were about halfway to the door of the McDonald’s, the sliding door of the van opened, and two women came running toward us.

“Zak, you need to say hello to my daughter,” the older woman said.

“Hello,” I said.

“Do you not recognize her?”

I was starting to feel uneasy. Seeing the way they carried themselves, I could tell that something about them was off, and not in a good way. “No, I don’t recognize her,” I replied. The girl, who was probably fifteen or sixteen, suddenly covered her face with her hands and burst into tears.

Oh boy. Here we go.

“Well, Zak, you’ve been having sex with my daughter through astral projection, and now she’s pregnant!”

And there it was.

Dave Schrader has been around a lot of strange people and could see right away that this wasn’t a good situation. He took charge and told the woman to leave or we would call the police, then ushered Chris and me inside. A few moments and a couple of comments later, they complied and went back to their van, while we went into Mickey D’s to laugh it off over some Big Mac goodness. All good, right?

Nope.

Twenty minutes later, the van returned, and I envisioned the sliding door opening and a machine gun opening fire on us. Seriously, the mother was clearly ten cents short of a two-dollar bill, and she didn’t seem to care how far the situation might escalate. As she marched toward the door of the McDonald’s, I got angrier with every step she took. I don’t want to be harassed while I’m trying to enjoy a meal with my friends, and I won’t shy away from a confrontation to stand up for my privacy. We met her in the entryway, and this woman proceeded to repeat that her daughter was crying because she’d been astral projecting herself and having a sexual relationship with me in the astral plane for a long time, and now she was expecting our love child. Someone was cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs.

FUN FACT:
T
HE
A
STRAL
P
LANE IS A THEORETICAL PLANE OF EXISTENCE THAT MANY RELI GIONS BELI EVE SOULS CROSS OVER BEFORE BEING BORN AND AFTER DEATH.
S
OME BELI EVE THAT THE ASTRAL PLANE CAN BE VI SITED CONSCIOUSLY THROUGH ASTRAL PROJECTION, MEDITATION AND MANTRA, NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE, LUCID DREAMING, OR OTHER MEANS.
S
OME CLAIM THAT THEY CAN USE THE “ASTRAL VEHICLE” TO SEPARATE THEIR CONSCIOUSNESS FROM THE PHYSICAL BODY AND TRAVEL THROUGH THE ASTRAL PLANE, BUT HAVI NG SEX ACROSS IT?
T
HAT WOULD BE AN INCREDIBLE FEAT OF METAPHYSICS.