I've had six cats in my life, starting with Rusty when I was born, up through Luna, one of the two I have now. As they both start to get into winter lazy hibernation mode, always crashing on me or near me, I started to think a little about the social activities of cats.
They can be real bastards at times. Luna barfs on the carpet and cries for no apparent reason, Cosmo spontaneously bites my ankles. I've been known to freak out and chase them around when they do something that irritates me. Likewise, I'm sure they get annoyed with me, briefly, when I don't feed them when they'd like or I yell at them for something.
At the end of the day though, the cats love you unconditionally, and you love them back. There are no strings attached to the relationship. They do something for you, you do something for them, and you really don't expect anything in return. You're able to overlook each other's issues and just enjoy each others' company and love.
We sure could learn a lot from our cats.
I can't imagine not having a cat or two in my home. I've had nine of them. My first cat, Fluffy, who grew up with me, used to sit on a large rock on the corner of our property and wait for me to come home from school and slept with me every night. She went in an out of the house through the milkshoot.
My Sassycat was literally an apendage for 20 years. I never sat down or slept without her on me (she used to sleep on my legs at night), except when I was pregnant with Ian when she found there wasn't much room in my lap. I think that's why she disliked Ian so much.
Schlomo, who was deaf, would lie atop the huge Cerwin Vega speakers when we had the stereo blasting. I suspect he loved the vibration.
Most of my cats (and the two I have now) were/are talkers, probably because I always talked to them and they learned they could get what they wanted by talking back.
Velcro brings me her toys and sits up and does her "circus cat" routine and talks when she wants me to play, and both Velvet and Velcro will ignore me for the first couple of hours when I get home after a weekend trip because they are ticked off I left them.
But as you said, in the end, everything is forgotten because we love them, and they love us, unconditionally.