By Ethan Forman
DANVERS — Chris Evans has found a way to practice his electric guitar late at night, without waking his family in their shared room at Motel 6.
Evans, who said he "can pretty much fix anything," rigged up a set of wireless headphones so only he can hear himself play. It occupies the time when he can't sleep.
Since August, Evans, his girlfriend, Dawnmarie Johnson, 30, and their 1-year-old son, Christopher Jr., have been living on the third floor of the Route 1 motel.
The 41-year-old former furniture mover said he suffers from a bulging disk in his back, degenerative joint disease and bipolar disorder. A native of Melrose, he enlisted in the Army National Guard at age 17 and re-enlisted twice, but said he didn't serve enough time to qualify for veterans benefits. His ailments, he said, prevent him from working the physical jobs he once did. He's applied for disability benefits from Social Security but hasn't heard yet whether he is eligible.
About a year ago, he started playing guitar, and his five months at Motel 6 have given him plenty of time to practice.
"I'm here. Now I've got the time," Evans says. "I mean, my car broke down. We are stuck here."
Evans, Johnson and their son are among hundreds of families cooking in microwave ovens in motel rooms across the state during an economic downturn that swamped the emergency shelter system. In Danvers, the Department of Transitional Assistance parks families at the Days Inn, Motel 6 and Knights Inn while seeking low-income apartments for them.
Christopher Jr. was one of 34 children living at Motel 6 in mid-December who were too young to go to school. He learned to walk in a motel room, where he has spent nearly half his life.
Families here live with daily uncertainty, not knowing when they will be moved. They must call the front desk every day at 1 p.m. to see whether there's any word about moving to a shelter or an apartment.
When they move into the motel, they're told their stay can be as short as a week or two or as long as eight months. The average stay is eight months, according to the Department of Housing and Community Development.
To get by, they cook with microwave ovens, crockpots and George Foreman grills; wash their dishes in the bathtub; and keep things organized in plastic crates. They cram the rooms' small refrigerators with as much fresh food as possible, and their clothes are stuffed onto small coat racks by the door. Some families store groceries in dresser drawers.
The families need to allow daily access so maids can clean their rooms and change the towels. They must pay for extras, such as phone calls and movie rentals.
Every day the same
Life at Motel 6 is boring, Evans said. Many days, they sleep until 10, since their son likes to sleep late.
"We wake up and sit here frustrated all day long," Evans said.
All three meals are cooked in the room. Evans has seen all the movies on HBO more than once. Motel 6 provides a half-dozen channels, but Evans hooked up his own TV so the family can watch movies on DVD.
To break the monotony, Evans will walk to a nearby gas station for cigarettes, but he has to walk down the side of an on-ramp to Route 1, then play "Frogger" to cross Route 114. His girlfriend will sometimes take their son to the motel's indoor pool to play.
On Saturday nights, Johnson's mom picks up their son for an overnight visit in Malden.
"We get a break from him, but we don't get a break from the room," Evans said.
Their playful son spends his days cruising around the room. He has a basket of toys. The motel lacks a play area, and there is no playground or park within walking distance.
"I just want a living room, a kitchen," Evans said. "Once I get my disability (from Social Security), then I can start to figure out what I'm going to do, maybe go to school and find something I can do that doesn't involve using my hands and my back."
The state placed Evans and Johnson at the motel after they could no longer afford the $1,000-a-month rent on their apartment on the Revere/Malden line.
Johnson used to work for Comcast but said she is now disabled after she got carpal tunnel syndrome in her wrist and had to have surgery. Her long-term disability benefits eventually ran out. She also suffers from other physical problems, and she, too, has bipolar disorder, she said.
Evans, who said furniture moving "beat the hell out of my body," has been out of work, and homeless off and on, for several years. Despite his bad back, he used to fix cars to make money, but two months ago their Ford Contour blew a head gasket, and now he has no transportation to even do that.
The couple now live on $422 a month in state assistance, not enough to fix the car. They rely on a shuttle provided by Motel 6 to get to Walmart, Market Basket and the Liberty Tree Mall, Evans said.
A neighborhood of sorts
Despite rules against having guests in rooms, the families at Motel 6 have formed a community of sorts. They watch each other's kids and cook meals for one another.
One friend Evans made two doors down, Dorsey "DJ" Gustus, a North Carolina father of a 5-year-old boy, got his marching orders Dec. 21.
Evans and Johnson estimate 60 families have come and gone since they arrived, and they feel as though they've fallen through the cracks. The state does keep tabs on families, sending social workers to visit each family at least twice a month.
The couple said they reached out to their social worker, who got them a $25 Walmart gift card to buy clothes after some of theirs were stolen while they visited his aunt in Peabody on Thanksgiving. They were left with six socks between them. The gift card allowed the couple to buy socks and underwear.
There have been other unsavory moments. Johnson said she was "jumped" by three women living upstairs when she went to retrieve a DVD player and got into an argument. She did not fight back, she said, for fear she would be thrown out of the motel. The fight triggered a response from police on Sept. 26, police records show. Johnson did not pursue charges against the women, police Sgt. Robert Bettencourt said.
"You have to take one day at a time," said Angela Grice, 35, who for a month and a half has lived at the Days Inn on Endicott Street with her 6-year-old daughter, a 16-year-old daughter and a 15-year-old son. "Me and my family are together. We are not split up. The town of Danvers has been very nice."
When Grice, a former food service worker at Northeastern University, lost her apartment in Roxbury, her family spent a month at a Boston shelter before being moved here.
Days Inn manager John Jalbert said families are allowed to use the phone and fax machine at the front desk for free and are welcome to use the breakfast area anytime for meals. The motel provides them with a continental breakfast.
For many families with small kids, the biggest challenge of living in one room is getting the kids to sleep.
"Usually, you would bring the baby into the baby's room, turn the monitor on, put the baby in the crib, the baby goes to sleep," Evans said. "But here, we're watching TV, we are not ready to go to bed when he's ready to go to bed, so we just gotta kind of let him fall asleep."
Despite that, Evans said his son makes motel life bearable.
"He makes it easier because he is such a happy kid," Evans said. "I play with him on the floor, you know. The kid, he'll make you laugh. No matter how miserable you are, he'll get a laugh out of you."
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Staff writer Ethan Forman can be reached at 978-338-2673 or by e-mail at eforman@salemnews.com.
