About this time the year before last, suddenly, the guts that used to make trouble suddenly disappeared from the screen of the B-ultrasound machine.Although it is certain that it has not broken through the wall of the stomach, any doctor who comes can find it.The diagnosis was that the little sac that secreted bile had mysteriously dried up like a lake in the desert. The doctor's suggestion is to open the belly and remove it, otherwise, this thing will not only be invisible, but may also cause complicated lesions.When I was preparing for the operation, I put a lot of books on the bedside, read them carefully, and typed the reading notes on the computer.On the one hand, of course, I have no opportunity to read when I should be studying, and when the organs in my body begin to decline, I am here to make up for it.It is more important to distract yourself from imagining the sad moment when your belly was cut open.Thinking of how the softest part of my body, which was born so naturally, would cut open the sharp blade, vague and sharp fear flashed through my heart from time to time.This idea is really lingering, and when I can't forget it even after reading a book, I have to go for a walk. After my body is tired, it seems easier to fall asleep.On the night before the operation, I had to go out for a walk.That night, walking along the Jinjiang River, I suddenly smelled a floating fragrance from the dim light of street lamps.So, I couldn't help but stop, take a deep breath, let the exciting fragrance fill my heart, and at the same time surround myself thinly.At this time, there are blurred lights on both sides of the gloomy Jinjiang River.So, peace of mind.So, I pushed aside the bushes and saw the wintersweet tree that bloomed early.

That night, when I returned to the hospital, I slept peacefully as never before. I am a plant lover.Love plants, and naturally love their blooms even more—a beautiful miracle of natural evolution.Because, when plants first appeared on the earth, they had no flowers.It was not until more than 100 million years ago that the new plants created by evolution suddenly released flowers.Although, for the plant itself, the flower means sex, which is the propagation strategy produced by the need for reproduction.But since the earliest civilization, people have been admiring the incredible structure of flowers, describing the coloring of flowers as if they were assisted by gods, and refining or imitating the intoxicating fragrance of flowers.

The habit of reading did not make me feel at ease, but the habit of loving plants and flowers helped me overcome a little psychological difficulty. With this experience, the first thing I did when I was discharged from the hospital after the operation was to see plum blossoms in the chilly spring. This incident made me understand another truth: a person can be addicted to one thing, especially when the thing looks beautiful both inside and out. Yes, I've been obsessed with observing and documenting plants for years.A friend kindly reminded me not to lose my mind by playing with things, but I am enjoying myself and want to go deeper into the plant kingdom.The written record is not enough, so I bought a camera, learned photography, and took pictures of the beautiful figures of the plants.There's a reason for this, I've told reporters, that I can't stand being ignorant of my surroundings.When this sentence was written in the newspaper, some people thought it was arrogant, but I thought it was humble.This world is like this, people walk on different roads, their understanding of world affairs can be so different, so contradict each other.I don't mean that I can understand the world by myself.I mean living in this world, I'm going to do my best to understand the world.Since the natural world we live in is so open and bright, it would be a kind of ignorant arrogance for people not to try to enter it with a humble attitude and learn it.

This world is really too big for an individual person.When I started to observe plants, I was limited to the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, especially the Hengduan Mountains, which is a particularly rich and diverse area of ​​life.This is not only because I was born and raised in this area, but also because it is a treasure trove of my writing, and I have been traveling through it for many years.In the process of traveling, one day, I suddenly realized that the object of my observation and recording should not only be human beings, but also the human environment—not just the mutual environment between human beings, but also animals and plants. The natural environment that constitutes, they also interact with human beings as the environment.So, I expanded the scope of my observation and recording.

So until 2010, the old disease broke out, I was admitted to the hospital, had surgery, and recovered after surgery.I can't go to the plateau for a while.Every day, I wander around the places with many plants in the urban area of ​​Chengdu.At this time, the wax plum is also in full bloom.I saw such fragrant and bright yellow flowers blooming, so I couldn't help but took a camera that I hadn't used for a long time. I went to the botanical garden, to Huanhuaxi, to Tazi Mountain, to Wangjiang Tower, and took pictures of them one by one.It is not enough to pass the addiction of shooting, go back and search for information, and experience the addiction of learning plant knowledge, it is not enough, and then come to the addiction of writing about plants and flowers.This way, the body and mind are very happy.This addiction is much more advanced and comfortable than having good food and wanting to drink two taels of good wine.

Ever since we took pictures of wintersweet, the land has returned to spring, and Chengdu, which has been gloomy for a winter, has gradually become blue and cloudless.Magnolia, crabapple, plum, peach, apricot, and plum bloom one after another, which is what the ancients called the twenty-four flowers of spring one after another.So, I made up my mind to take pictures and write about all the main ornamental plants in the city where I have lived for more than ten years.In the meantime, I got a word from Mr. Zhu Kezhen's article: phenology.So I changed the name of this group of articles originally planned to be named "Chengdu Cao Mu Ji" to "Chengdu Wu Hou Ji" and wrote them one by one, plus the photos I took, and posted them on my Sina blog one after another.Unexpectedly, some netizens sent compliments, even corrected some of my fallacies, and even newspaper editors contacted me for publication.It was originally a matter of entertaining myself while writing, but someone is willing to share it, which is also an encouragement to me.It was originally planned to write a series of prosperous flower events in Chengdu from spring to autumn in one year.Maybe it’s because of doing this pleasant thing, and my physical recovery is much faster than expected. As a person who can’t stay still in one place, I leave Chengdu frequently to go deep into the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, to broaden my horizons at home and abroad, and come back once I go out. , Often the flowering period of a certain plant has been missed.So much so that what could be done in one year took two years.Even so, there are still several things that should be written that have not yet been written, and Phoenix United has invited them to publish a collection.

I once read a passage by Muir, one of the pioneers of American natural literature and a pioneer of environmentalists. If a person cannot love the land in which he is in, then his words about loving the country may also be empty ,—and therefore false.At this time, I was on a business trip in Shanghai. On the seventh day of the Lunar New Year, Du Fu was not in his study in Chengdu on the day when he wrote "I'm back on the Day of the Cottage", so I couldn't find the original words. I have lived in Chengdu for more than ten years, and I often hear people say that they love Chengdu.But the reasons seem to be relatively consistent in the level of life enjoyment.I love the city too, but I wonder if there is any other reason to get a little bit off the material plane.Even as far as the human body is concerned, it seems that the eyes should be an important sense organ that cannot be ignored.Moreover, the eye is an organ that is good. When we see beauty, let us reflect on why there are so many rough things in life.It can lead us to a slightly higher level.Pamuk said: We must have at least one reflection in our lives, leading us to examine the environment in which we are placed.

I think that writing this group of flowers and trees in this city by myself has some meaning in this way. Because, this is not observation and writing in the sense of pure science - although it contains some of the most basic knowledge of botany, but a little deeper, you will enter the human history of the city.Du Fu, Xue Tao, Yang Sheng'an...almost all cultural celebrities related to the city's history have left praises for the city's flowers and trees. Therefore, these flowers and trees are actually closely related to the city's history.The domestication and cultivation of these beautiful plants is the history of people transforming and beautifying the environment.Recording these plants and trees in words and discovering the beauty of each flower is also a process for people to enrich their own aesthetics and deepen these aesthetic feelings.Today, when education is so popular, we lack aesthetic education.An important function of literature lies in the education of beauty.I want to write these words, if it cannot affect others, at least it is a kind of self-education for the author himself.

I have also published more than ten books, but I have never had the experience of writing a preface for my own.This time, the publisher said that only with such a text can the book appear complete in style. I don’t want to disappoint their good intentions to make this book more beautiful, so I easily broke the rule of not writing a preface for myself. rule.But what is there to write about?In fact, some of the comments that have been posted before have also been posted in the articles in this book.To say more, I want to underestimate the readers, so I write here the origin of this "accident" book for me, which can be regarded as an explanation of this "accident".