Oct. 27, 2014
By Ryan Schulz | Subscribe to Commodore Nation
Every morning Patrick Yarber opens his eyes and sees light, he hopes it isn’t his last. Due to the effect of degenerative eye conditions, he doesn’t know how many more days he will wake up and see the sunlight shining through, which is why he is not taking any day for granted.
You may have heard Yarber’s story by now. He’s been featured on ESPN’s College GameDay and been the subject of a number of newspaper articles. A long-time Nashville resident and staunch supporter of the Commodores, Yarber suffers from retinitis pigmentosa and macular degeneration, which have rendered him nearly blind. But not even his failing vision has stopped him from continuing to pursue his personal quest to visit the home stadium of every Division I FBS team.
A Vanderbilt fan since 1978 when his Antioch High School friend, Mike Woodard, received a scholarship to kick for the Commodores, Yarber has been a regular in the stands at Vanderbilt football games ever since. He didn’t know it when he first started going to games, but football games would soon become a much bigger part of his life.
Yarber made Vanderbilt Stadium his home on Saturdays in the fall, and when the Commodores were on the road, he was typically there as well. He has experienced the good, the bad and the ugly as a Vanderbilt fan. For Yarber, the 1982 season remains his favorite. “The home game against Tennessee that year was really special,” recalled the 6-foot-6 Yarber.
For years, Yarber’s travels to football stadiums were dependent on Vanderbilt’s road schedule. Where Vanderbilt went, he went. But in 1984, Yarber expanded his stadium travels. He went to Georgia Tech, Michigan and Ohio State. He liked it so much that the thought of visiting other venues stuck.
But attending games at every Division I FBS school? No way.
“I thought it was pretty cool, so I just started going to three or four new places every year, but it still wasn’t a thing of wanting to go to every one,” Yarber said. “I just wanted to go somewhere I hadn’t been.”
Each year, Yarber, who lives in Donelson, would add new stadiums to his list. When he visited a stadium, he returned home with a game program and ticket stub to remember his trip. He then documented his experience in a journal. Each page represented a different stadium and included the date of the game, the final score and any highlights from the trip. His journal pages were soon filling up with memories from attending games throughout the country. But it wasn’t until about seven years ago that Yarber’s hobby of attending games at different stadiums became something else–a race against time.
Both of Yarber’s eye conditions–retinitis pigmentosa (RP) and macular degeneration–are hereditary. His mother had RP, but it never developed in her like it has him, and his father was a carrier for macular degeneration. It did not impact his father until the later years of his life. But Patrick was not as fortunate.
“Some people get the silver and the stocks, and I get the bad eyes. At least I inherited something,” laughed Yarber.
RP has taken all of Yarber’s peripheral vision, while macular degeneration has robbed him of his central vision.
“When you don’t have any peripheral vision and you are looking through a gun barrel and the center of that starts messing up, it kind of tends to play havoc with you,” Yarber said. “You have two things that are basically taking your whole visual life.”
Through the years, Yarber’s vision has only worsened, and it forced him into early retirement in 2011 after spending the previous 15 years as a money collector, including the last 11 at Buffaloe and Associates, a local law firm in Nashville.
He takes Vitamin A pills to help slow down his loss in vision and makes regular visits to the ophthalmologist. This summer, Yarber suffered an unfortunate accident in which he scratched the cornea of his right eye. The injury has only worsened his vision to the point that he is now 90 percent blind. Yarber says he was 80 percent blind prior to the accident.
His vision has taken a lot of things from him, but it hasn’t halted his desire to attend football games.
If anything, his failing vision has been a driving force in his quest to visit every Division I FBS stadium.
It was an idea that Yarber had one day while thumbing through his journals. With each turn of the page, the vastness of his stadium journey began to come to light. “By the time I started counting, I had been to two-thirds of them,” Yarber said. “I said, this is doable and then it became a goal.”
From that point on, Yarber’s life changed forever.
Las Cruces, New Mexico and Ypsilanti, Michigan soon became towns Yarber needed to visit.
If he was not attending a Vanderbilt game, he was somewhere else exploring another stadium.
Often traveling alone, Yarber relies heavily on public transportation to get him to and from the airport, hotel and stadium. At games, Yarber’s eyes are never far from his pair of binoculars, which enable him to get his best look at the game via the stadium video board. He also carries a radio and headphones with him to each game, and never leaves early, no matter how lopsided the score gets.
“Most of the traveling I’ve done by myself,” Yarber said. “I’m not a loner, but I don’t mind being somewhere by myself. When I go somewhere to a ballgame, you are so busy doing stuff that you don’t really realize that you are by yourself.”
Still, as Yarber’s condition has worsened, his ability to get from stadium to stadium has grown increasingly more difficult, and he has had to rely more on others around him.
“The really bad getting around by myself didn’t really start until three or four years ago,” Yarber remarked. “Up until then, I could function pretty well. I wouldn’t go into a city and rent a car. When I flew into a city, I got around by taxi, trying to stay close to campus. It’s been the last three or four years that it has gotten so difficult that I have to have help sometimes getting in and out of airports and getting in and out of the stadium.
“I’m so stubborn and hard-headed that I’m not smart enough to realize that when you’ve got 10 percent of your vision left, you don’t fly 3,000 miles to go to a football game by yourself. I’ve run into a lot of nice people along the way, who have been very helpful and kind.”
Even as his vision deteriorated, Yarber saw no reason to slow down. He had come so close, and he wasn’t about to give up.
“Not when you are that close to being able to see all the places,” Yarber said.
Over time, the venues began to add up, as did the airline miles. Yarber, of course, has logged his flights as well, 1,200 total, since he first began going to games. He estimates he has been to approximately 450 college games, averaging 10 or 11 a year since he first started attending Vanderbilt games.
Finally, after years of attending games, Yarber accomplished his goal after visiting the Kibbie Dome in Moscow, Idaho to watch the Vandals play Old Dominion on Nov. 9, 2013.
After the Idaho trip, he had seen games on all 125 FBS campuses. Each trip holds a special place with him. He can tell you the details of the visit to every stadium–the final score, the weather at the game, his seat location and the hotel he stayed in.
“I remember a lot of things, but when you don’t see, your other senses take over,” Yarber said. “I can smell good, I can hear good and I have a pretty good memory.”
Although he has been to the home venue of every FBS team, one stadium remains his favorite after all these years: Vanderbilt Stadium.
“I am closing in on 200 home games in that stadium since it opened in 1981,” Yarber said. “It is close to home. It is clean and small and it is easy for me to get around in.”
After his trip to Idaho, the quest was over–but just for one season. He had checked off every campus, but the journey continues. This year, three new programs joined the FBS ranks. Additionally, a few schools have built new stadiums since Yarber last visited.
Yarber’s journey continued this fall with trips to Old Dominion, Appalachian State and Georgia Southern. He also has visits scheduled to Baylor and Minnesota to see their new stadiums.
And after that, the beat goes on. In 2015, UNC Charlotte will join the FBS ranks. Additionally, he already has Vanderbilt’s game at Houston circled on his calendar, so he can see the Cougars’ new stadium opening next season.
With new stadiums being opened around the country, it has now become a battle to stay ahead, and Yarber has no reason to slow down as long as he still sees the light of day every morning he opens his eyes.
“There isn’t anything guaranteed to stop me from losing my sight,” Yarber said. “If I could stop it where it is at just to have a little bit of vision, that would be great, but whatever is going to happen is going to happen. I try not to worry on it or dwell on it. I just keep living my life and doing what I like to do. One day if it all comes to a crashing halt, I had fun when I could have fun.”
