I don't drink or party. What I'm working out is whether the man I marry needs to share that value, or only be willing to follow my preference.

Alcohol: yes, I'm entirely aware, and I don't drink either. Partly the epilepsy — for years I simply couldn't, and I could probably get away with it now, but the habit of not bothering stuck and I've never once missed it. So you're not going to be the sober one at the table managing a husband. You'll be the sober one at the table next to another sober one. Keep your Glühwein at Christmas. I'm not coming for it.

And while we're in that paragraph of yours — you said crowds are about as stimulated as you're willing to get, and then in the same breath owned up to a great many concerts. I live in a village and my favourite band has two saxophones in it. I think we'll manage.

Drugs: no. Not now, not in the future, not weed, not edibles, not anything else. You asked me directly whether I saw myself using recreationally again, and you deserved a clean answer rather than the essay you got. The answer is no.

I'm still not going to pretend I've arrived at your position, because you'd know, and it would be worth nothing to you. I hold a view about the law. I have no personal interest whatsoever and haven't had for twenty years. That is the entire distance between us, and I think it's a good deal narrower than it looked at eleven o'clock on Sunday night.

What I agree with without qualification is the part you actually cared about — what we'd build, and what we'd tell our children. You said you wouldn't hand them a slogan; you'd tell them exactly what you told me. What you watched happen in your own family, what it cost, that you know other views exist, and that this one is yours. I think that's precisely right, and it's what I'd want them hearing from both of us. There are no drugs in our family. That is not me standing aside and letting you have this one. It's that between your certainty and my opinion, I would far rather have your certainty in the room our children grow up in.

You told me on Sunday that you were boring. You said that to a man who doesn't drink, doesn't smoke, hasn't touched anything in twenty years, lives up a hill, and once took a train specifically to acquire an ice cream Snickers. Between us we're the two most boring people on that app. I've never been more pleased about anything.