NOTES FROM THE WORKING CLASS: Javon Monte 1994 - 2024

The blue-skied Seattle day is warm for February 8th. I walk across the freeway overpass on Madison Avenue and turn right onto 6th Avenue. A man is huddled on the steps leading up to the Plymouth Congregational Church. The building is the color of a white palace.

The man is young, black, lean, but he takes up the entire landing at the bottom of the steps; his battered blue backpack is large and looks heavy. He is crying, sobbing into a blinding-white concrete buttress.

I walk halfway down the block, but I can’t stop thinking about him. I knew I could not live with myself if I kept walking.

He does not seem to know I am standing there. Maybe he doesn’t care. I ask him how I can help. He shakes his head, letting me know there is nothing I can do for him. I don’t know why but he stops crying and gives me a big smile.

I walk among the addicted, the sick, the poor. Those without a home are living everywhere, covered by makeshift tents, tucked under blankets, tarps, sleeping bags. I imagine I am one of them. I know there have been times when my life could have gone one way or the other.

Another day, I am walking north on 3rd Avenue, Downtown Seattle. I spot a young black man from the corner of my eye and feel him moving in tandem with me. The rim around his mouth is ringed with froth. His backpack looks familiar. He is the same man who sat on the white steps. I tell him I don’t have any money. He tells me he doesn’t want money. He wants to talk.

He tells me he is lonely. I ask him about his family. I want to know if his family cares about him. He says they do but they don’t understand him. They don’t understand his struggle. He is seeing and hearing things they don’t see and they don’t hear. He talks about angels and demons. I think he might be schizophrenic. I’m no expert, but I know schizophrenia. (My Mother, My Son.)

He tells me his name is Javon Monte. We walk eight blocks together. The more I listen, the more I understand why he wants someone to listen to him. He wants to be treated like a human being.

Talking to him spurs me to join “Sacred Encounters” through Christ Our Hope Catholic Church. Every Wednesday, we serve people living on the street. We bring them water, food, clothing, but most important of all, we listen.

It’s scary to walk among addicts. Some of them are rocking on their feet, slumping over, falling to the ground. Trash spills from their bags and backpacks. Their dirty hands hold black-streaked squares of foil laced with fentanyl—the drug called fetty, bubbles, blue.

I often see Javon Monte, but he is always in a different place: between 3rd and 4th Avenue on Pike Street, on Pine Street across from where Macy’s used to be, and in Westlake Park. Both of his ears glint with tiny diamonds embedded in gold cross studs. He asks me for rosary beads and he puts them on around his neck. Then, he asks me for a hug.

Not all people on the street are another face of God. Some are fallen angels, and sometimes it is best to walk away. Javon Monte is different. Every time I see him, he wants a hug as though I am his mother. I think he is an angel that can be saved.

The last time I saw Javon Monte, I could not hug him. Three of my ribs were broken. Javon Monte wanted to know what had happened to me. His lips looked blue. I couldn’t tell him anything I wanted anyone to know. I never saw Javon Monte again.

There is rule about living on the street. Anyone who disappears is in jail, rehab, or dead.

I know Javon Monte is dead. His name was on a list of people who died unsheltered. A year after I met him, Javon Monte Wilson, 30, died of a fentanyl/methedrine-involved overdose outdoors at 3rd Avenue and Marion Street.

He died next to a busy bus stop during morning rush hour. If I ask why he died, there is no one answer. Dying on the street doesn’t leave strokes on the pavement to explain the story of his life.

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