Surely, every Douglass alumni and Riverview resident remembers "Will It Go 'Round in Circles?", the '70's-era danceable, singable, odd-sounding pop song by singer Billy Preston. It rose to the Number One spot on Billboard's Top 100 for two weeks back in 1973.
Will It Go 'Round in Circles? Was Preston singing back in the '70's about the New Vision Youth's trip through Cleek's Corn Maze, on Saturday, October 27, 2012, 40 years into the future?
Just sample this bit of conversation among the Youth boys that Saturday afternoon:
"We lost."
"Yeah, we lost."
"You got us lost."
"No I didn't."
"Yeah you did.. you said 'go that away."
"It was a happy day at the Corn Maze," says New Vision Director Johnny Mae Swagerty. "We even had 12 chaperones along with the kids and basically, they got led around by the kids. It was a blast.. one of the best times the kids had this year."
43 New Vision kids and other children from around the Kingsport community, ran, jumped, shouted, yelled, and simply enjoyed.. simply getting lost.
SLIDE SHOW OF THE NEW VISION YOUTH VISIT TO CLEEK'S CORN MAZE
...And the beat goes on...
"Miss Johnnie Mae... the guide says go this way."
"No.. out is over here."
"Whose Number 4? Which way do we go, Number 4?"
"This way, Mr. Spud.. this way."
"Wait a minute.. we just went that way. It was a dead-end, remember."
"Here, over here. This is the way out."
"Oh yeah... we lost again."
"Yeah, we are lost," says chaperone Lawrence Myrick, a.k.a. 'Spud.' "The corn maze was great and the kids are having a really good time.. but lost. I let the kids pick the way, and I numbered them to give everybody a chance to lead. I let them pick the clues to get out, and we still got hopelessly lost."
"For a while, the way they were leading us, I thought we were gonna come out in Bristol."
The New Vision Kids' visit to the Corn Maze, grown every year at Cleek's Farm off Highway 11-W past John B. Dennis Bypass, was sponsored by New Vision Youth, APAX Medical, the South Central Kingsport Community Development Corporation, and Kingsport Parks and Recreation's Community Services Division. They also got to eat homegrown food native to a farm, purchase farm souvenirs, go on a hayride, and spend quality time down on the farm..
..lost in the Corn Maze:
"OK, wait a minute, who's Number 5? It's your turn."
"Wait a minute, he's Number 5. Number 5, lead the way."
'Uh oh... we lost again."
"Number 6.. you're up."
"Get us outta here."
"YAYYYY!!"
