loving

1. 1
   adjective

   Showing or expressing deep affection and warm care toward other people.

   Their loving relationship lasted for more than fifty years.

   She wrote a loving note and tucked it into his suitcase.

   Similaraffectionate, caring, warm, tender, kind

   Oppositecold, unloving, uncaring, hostile

   Note

   Nouns for husband and wife are its natural company: a loving wife, a loving husband. It compares both ways. You can say more loving and most loving, or use the single-word lovinger and lovingest. Before a noun it is warm and literal. Only in the slang minced oath does the same position turn it into an expletive, and the tone of the sentence tells the two apart.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of love.

   He is loving his new job at the bakery.

   The children are loving the snow this winter.

   Note

   Here the word does a verb's work. With be it forms the progressive, and as a gerund it fills a noun's slot. Because love is usually a stative verb, the progressive shifts the meaning toward present enjoyment, as in loving the snow or loving a new job, rather than settled affection. Only context separates the gerund from the noun of the same spelling and the affectionate adjective.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   The action or practice of feeling and showing love for someone or something.

   The old couple's home was filled with years of loving and laughter.

   True loving asks for nothing in return.

   Similaraffection, devotion, tenderness, caring, fondness

   Oppositehatred

   Note

   An old noun in its own right, though it looks like love plus -ing: it descends from Old English lufung through Middle English lovyng. It is usually uncountable, but it takes a plural when separate feelings or acts are meant. Herman Melville's Moby-Dick (1851) speaks of "all natural lovings and longings," pairing it with an alliterating partner for rhythm.

4. 4
   adjectiveslangeuphemisticUSbefore a noun

   Euphemistic form of fucking.

   I can't get this loving door to open.

   He told them to mind their own loving business.

   Note

   A minced oath swaps the taboo intensifier for a harmless word and keeps the emphasis intact. It goes only before a noun. Like the word it replaces, it often colors the whole remark rather than its noun: eat and drink like a loving pig. It is frequently clipped to lovin' and can be wedged into a set phrase, as in John Sack's Company C (1995): "At long lovin' last!" As US slang, it belongs in casual talk.

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