An ode to the carefree, reckless years of adolescence and the places that served as the frolicking grounds for the youthful escapades…
by: Grace Ann Elinski
You’ll find the sign for D’lo Water Park about thirty miles south of Jackson, Mississippi, off Highway 49. The boast of “Water Park” is misleading in the sense that there are no slides or lazy rivers, just a few RV hookups and cabins on the Strong River. The rope swing is well and gone. I always liked D’lo because there were no laws there. You could bring in glass bottles and smoke whatever you wanted; no one batted an eye. Many people would litter, we didn’t, beside cigarette butts I guess. We squatted to pee like animals. My friends and I were always half-drunk by the time we got there. The drive usually took about thirty minutes from Belhaven and an extra ten if we stopped for boiled peanuts, an Ocean Water from Sonic, or a Big Gulp (to spike of course). In high school we would take my in my Acura to D’lo, a car void of air conditioning. Our sweaty thighs would slip on the leather seats and we’d lower the windows to dry it up. Humid air with a slight breeze was ever so refreshing to these sixteen year olds. To enjoy the D’lo water park, all you needed to do was drive up and park. I am not sure it was free, I just know we never stopped inside. And we always smelled like pot.
There were a few picnic tables through D’lo’s grounds and sometimes a family or two were about, but it was usually just us. This was good because we were loud and so was our speaker. The creek had a bit of a shallow point where water pooled up. We’d lay up there in a spot shallow enough that our ears weren’t filled with water. Then, there were rocks that helped formed some rapids. After I’d get drunk, I’d always show everyone my “body rafting.” People hated this. The rapids kind of whip you every whichaway ‘until you drop down between the rocks and it always takes a minute to be spit out to the surface. Then you float. I am lucky I never hit my head.
There weren’t many places to get situated and comfortable. The only bank of the river was some a man-made concrete pathway. It was agreeable enough for laying out if you put a book under your head. After placing our towels, getting the speaker set up, and setting watermelon out, we’d bask. We’d then wade in the water, keeping an eye out for snakes. Someone would get a little too comfortable on an inner tube and start floating toward the highway. Someone else would go fetch them. We reveled in the perfect mix of Miller High Life, Grateful Dead, and tanning lotion. We would stay for hours on end.
Katie laid out in a tie dye shirt and blue bikini bottoms. Her head rested on a folded up pizza box while a citronella candle burned by her ear. Gabby rested on her elbows wearing a white baseball cap reading Trust Women, her neck facing the beating sun. There were multiple pairs of converse and denim shorts lying around, and everyone’s respective cigarette pack. We used the creek sand to exfoliate before baking in the sun and napping on the rock. The day always came to end with a dead speaker, or a busload of kids, or the emptying of whatever stash we had. The Mississippi sun might wake us with its beating. We glowed til we burnt red. We washed off the dirt from our bank nap in the river and dunk our heads one final time. The natural hairdryer that was Highway 49 with the windows down on a June night would suffice for whatever fish fry or illegal things we’d be doing later.
The ride home of moaning and groaning would be quickly revived by Gucci Mane and enthusiasm about a new place to go. I’m sure we stunk but God did the boys just love us; sun-kissed and baby oiled, sporting a bikini top as a bra. Our denim cutoffs would hang past our tan lines, hips out. We dragged cigarettes to and fro our sun chapped lips like it was our job. We watched the brass band at Martins til early morning and braided dandelions in the park at sunrise. We felt invincible, and we were. We were for a long while.
Grace Ann Elinski is a writer and photographer from Jackson, Mississippi. Her creative writing and photography have been featured in The Southern Quill and PRODUCT.
