A couple of weeks ago, a colleague asked me about my ‘love language’. What was mine, did I have one, what did I think about it all, she wanted to know.

After I had finished vomiting in my mouth a little bit, and my eyes were back in their sockets after rolling into the back of my head, I asked what the hell she was talking about.

“You know,” she said, “how do you tell people you love them?”

After laughing awkwardly and joking that, um,I don’t, I realised three seconds later that I wasn’t actually joking, and that I really, trulydon’t.

As she threw a litany of examples at me in an attempt to warm my cold, long-dead heart, I realised, actually, I did tell people, I just never told them loudly. Because the nicest things often aren’t the loudest.

The things that are done because the person wants todo, not be seen. The people who please out of a desire, not a duty.

I thought of the time my boyfriend – who lacks sentiment at the best of times and who I am particularity glad doesn’t read my work right about now – woke before me to clear my windscreen which was covered in the thickest of ice. He knew I would a) be running late and wouldn’t have the time to do it myself and b) probably wouldn’t be smart enough to know how to clear it anyway.

So, I asked around. I got 12 people to tell me exactly the things they’ve done for others – whether that be family, spouse of friends – to say I love you, without saying I love you at all.

Osher Gunsberg has all the love advice…