Friends remember ‘light’ Yoho brought to UNC

Students and friends of UNC student Shawn Yoho gathered around a single yellow candle in his memory Thursday on the lawn near Lawrenson Hall.

Yoho, a sophomore communication studies major, died from injuries sustained in a car accident in Utah Jan. 12.

Childhood friends of Yoho, Eric Bloom, a junior communication studies major at the University of Northern Colorado, and Jesse Christy led the candlelight vigil.

"Shawn was a light to my world and I bet that he was a light to all yours," Christy said. "Shawn made me smile no matter what. That's what I remember most about him."

Matt Estrin, a worship minister at Journey Christian Church, met Yoho at Chipotle the Thursday before the accident and had asked him about a sociology class he was in.

"The professor made a blanket statement that if you're a religious person, you're gonna hate this class and said ‘I'm pretty much gonna slam your faith,'" Estrin said.

He asked Yoho how he felt about it, to which he quoted James 1:2-4 from the Bible, a passage that addresses perservering faith even under scrutiny.

"I can't wait to get my faith tested,' he said. That's the last memory I'll have of Shawn and that's a great memory," Estrin said.

Kyle Hope, one of Yoho's bandmates, was in the car with Yoho when the accident occurred and shared his best memories of him during the vigil.

"It's a recurring theme how he makes friends because he was kind of a creeper sometimes and the way I met him is kind of a God thing," Hope said. "Senior year of high school, we were at two separate schools and at two separate churches and he somehow found out that I was a worship leader and that I was good at guitar. He somehow got my number, I don't know how, and he just started texting me."

Hope said Yoho asked him if he wanted to be in his band. After listening to his music, Hope told Yoho he was not into his punk style of music, but they decided to give it a chance anyway.

"Later on we actually met at the same church, and it was kind of awkward, but we found out we were both going to UNC and that we were gonna be in the same dorm," Hope said. "It was kind of like, ‘Oh, God has a purpose for this.'"

They eventually got their band together and were continually writing songs and playing their guitars.

"He was so talented, he could harmonize with anything," he said. "It was amazing. I'll definitely remember that. I don't know if I'll find that again. God put us together and he opened this door to go to California, it was our first big gig and we were really excited to go."

On the day of the accident, he said, they stopped at a scenic point in Utah.

"I went out on this ledge and looked out at all of the sky and the hills, it was just beautiful," he said. "I went over to the edge by myself and closed my eyes and felt the wind and felt God and a couple seconds later I felt Shawn touch me. We just talked about it together for a second. It was beautiful. I felt like it was kind of a goodbye. It was a God thing, just to be with each other for a second, just me and him."

 Hope said it was Yoho's dream to go on tour and spread his faith.

"He just wanted to reach out," he said. "That just shows his heart and how much love he had for everybody. That's why there are a million people affected by this. Gosh, I'm gonna miss him so much. I know he's with Jesus."

Hope said they often described the music they created as heavenly.

"We were writing a song for this camp and he made a guitar line with his new pedal board and we'd always say, ‘Man, that sounds so heavenly,'" he said. "I just know he knows what that really means now. He was a God-sent friend and I loved him. I'll miss Shawn. He had a beautiful heart."

Bloom said he loved hearing all of the stories and told the crowd that most of his memories involved adventures with Yoho.

"Most of my memories with Shawn are of laughing at one of our own expenses," Bloom said. "We were playing dodgeball and (I) was wearing glasses. Shawn has a rocket for an arm and he hits me in the corner of my glasses and shatters them. Shawn just comes over with this goofy smile and says, ‘Oh man, I'm so sorry,' and I was just like, ‘I wish you had glasses right now.'"

He said his favorite memory of Yoho was at a mutual friend's brother's wedding and they decided to go four-wheeling in the groom's Nissan Altima before the rehearsal dinner.

"We're up in Conifer and we decide to find some areas that have some sweet turns we're gonna go around," he said. "We were going around this corner drift and on the left side is a 10-foot ditch and to the right was a mountain. Shawn didn't realize that you have to avoid the ditch, so he drifts around it and half the car is hanging in the ditch and half is hanging on the dirt. We're all laughing and Taylor and I had to walk three miles to finally find a firefighter. We come back and Shawn and Joe are just tossin' a baseball."

Bloom also shared a time when he and Yoho shared a cabin for two weeks at camp. Bloom and the other cabinmates were always woken up at 6 a.m. by Yoho's ringtone of "Gone" by Toby Mac.

"At 6 o'clock his Toby Mac ringtone would go off and wake up everyone," he said. "I've been realizing over this past week, there's that line in his ringtone, ‘You never know what you got till it's gone.' When I think of Shawn over the last week, as I've been processing through all the emotions and the heartache, I never really, really realized the friend I had in Shawn until now. He was one of the most genuine guys I've ever met."

Jarrett Durant, a sophomore journalism major, lived with Yoho this past semester and copes with the loss by telling stories involving Yoho.

"Living with him, we just kind of forged this really tight-knit family," Durant said. "We spent our entire days with that kid. We have stories that never ever run out. That's how we've been dealing with this whole thing is just going through all those funny stories and we have too many…It's been crazy getting to know him the way we have."