The rain steadily beating down for days with no sunshine in sight and a personal dilemma that is not going to get resolved any time soon have ensured that I smile less often these days. It is at times like these that I feel that I need a mild anti-depressant to uplift my sagging spirits. Though I am not the kind who'd be easily knocked down by small setbacks and roadblocks that I come across in my daily life, I must admit that sometimes, the sum of all these small setbacks and roadblocks can overwhelm me. And coupled with incessant rains and personal dilemmas, these dark forces take the shape of a dark mood angel that threatens to swallow me up at a slightest slip.
And at such times, to rescue myself from the clutches of the dark mood angel, I turn to my twenty-plus year old anti-depressant. This particular anti-depressant happens to be a book titled 'If Tomorrow Comes' by Sidney Sheldon that I got from a used bookstore several years ago. Fortunately, it has had no expiry date so far.
To the uninitiated, 'If Tomorrow Comes' by Sidney Sheldon is a pure out-and-out fiction and a total page-turner paperback. And I am not ashamed to say that to this day, it remains my most favorite(-st) and best(-est) anti-depressant despite having some seriously inspiring biographies and autobiographies on my bookshelf. Yea, and favorite(-st) book in my bookshelf too. I am not aware about what critics thought about it when the book was first published but when I first read it, I was blown away by the story-telling. Without giving too much away, when the story starts, we see that Tracy Whitney, the protagonist of the story, is staring into an extremely bad nowhere-to-go and black hole like situation. And as the plot unfolds, her fortunes change mainly due to her phenomenal ability to think on her feet and most importantly, her will to fight. Without fail, every time I pick up this book, a smile that slowly appears on my face (without my knowledge of course) remains plastered till I reach the last line on the last page. And continues to stay on till much later (again without my knowledge of course).
I am not sure why I got fascinated by this book the way I did but I guess for a tenth-grader who had just graduated from Hardy Boys, this book was a revelation. Since then, it has remained my de facto anti-depressant. So whenever I am in the dumps, or feel that I'm falling behind in the never-ending race, I dig out this dog-eared and yellow-paged book from the dark recesses of my bookshelf and immerse myself into it. By the time I'm finished with the adventures of Tracy, the dark mood angel is all but vanquished and like I mentioned earlier, I end up with a satisfied smile on my face. Most importantly, there's a nice feeling in my head. The world starts to look good again and I'm all set to go off on an adventure to seek my fortunes. It is surprising that even after several years and several books later, an 80's pageturner fiction can cheer me up thus after every read. But that's what this book is all about. To me. An anti-depressant plus something more. So, If tomorrow comes, I'm ready.
.JPG)