summer 1924.... Young Gadamer organized a picnic, including a cart that had to be pulled to the site, which he enlisted philosophers Hartmann and Heidegger to endure, each pulling one shaft of the 2-shafted cart (meant for a mule). Late in life, Gadamer recalled that day (citation available):
“Heidegger on such occasions displayed a charming boyish sense of humor. When, on the return journey, the cart was empty, he suddenly let Hartmann do all the pulling on his own...jumped onto the cart and opened his umbrella.”Martin was 34, composing Being and Time.
summer 1946 (a year after "Conversation on a Country Path")....Chinese philosopher Paul Shih-yi Hsiao was in Todtnauberg studying with Heidegger. Eventually, they decided to translate the Tao Te-Ching together (citation available).
“Because of the very thorough nature of Heidegger’s thinking, we had only worked on eight of eighty-one chapters by the end of the summer. According to the insightful observation of his friend Hans Fischer-Baricol on a personal visit, Heidegger was 'a timid, very shy person. Not only modest in the conventional sense, but one who listened in a remarkable way, very attentive to what the other person had to say, humble....Committed to thinking, and, it seemed to me, most people did not want to come without any thoughts before the presence of these eyes—these truly remarkable, astonishing eyes that listened rather than looked. Even though the nature of Heidegger’s humor was not clear to me, these eyes were able to laugh.'...”Martin, 56, would compose, that autumn, "What Are Poets For?" after the Holocaust.
I say: life…Let there be fair flourishing.
