My wife and I went away earlier this week for a few days for our 10-year anniversary. Little did we know that when we got home on Thursday afternoon, our beloved black kitty, center of our world for longer than we’ve been married, would be in end stage kidney failure and have to leave us. He seemed fine when we left and at his last vet appointment less than three months ago we were keeping an eye on very early kidney function concerns, so this came completely out of left field.

I want everyone to know just how wonderful Oskar was; he was truly special and one-of-a-kind. I've spent most of the last two days on this post because I really needed something to do and seeing the happy memories has both helped and hurt. I also don't trust my own memory very much; I remember TV stations very well, but when it comes to other things, I feel like I forget things pretty quickly, and I'm worried I'll forget things so I wanted to get as much down as I possibly could as quickly as I could.

The worst part of this, I think, is that everything in the house was the kitty’s, we just lived here. So everything we look at reminds us of him. This morning, I got out of bed and there was no kitty waiting to walk with me to the restroom, or sitting on the edge of the tub purring and receiving pets or scritch-a-scratches. No kitty jumped on the bed after I got back to demand pets and cuddles. It’s really hard to do much of anything around the house without thinking of him when he was literally everywhere we were.

Oskar’s story with us begins when he was 3½ years old in 2013. An old friend of my wife’s from middle school was looking to rehome her black cat, Oskar. We agreed to take him, and met her half-way to get him and his supplies and bring him home. What’s funny is that some of her description of him was inaccurate. She said he didn’t like people, but what he didn’t like were noisy people and parties. She said he preferred a litter box with a lid, but he actually preferred not having it. When we got him, he never made any sound. Before too long, we had conversations with him all the time.

We got him home and he stayed in or close to his carrier for a while. Over several weeks, he gradually got more and more brave, coming down the stairs in our then-rental to see what was what. Before long, he was everywhere all the time. When we bought our house the following year and moved, I thought it would be more of the same, but even by then he had a baseline level of trust in us such that I put his carrier down on the floor of the laundry room and sat with him, and it took him a matter of seconds to slink out, look around, and seemingly say “okay, I guess this is home now, since you’re here.”

He was so smart, smarter than some people I’ve met. It’s one of my favorite qualities of his. He was shockingly clever and it showed:

When we moved into the house, I’m not clear if he made the hole or the hole was already there, but he started climbing into our box spring from underneath. This wasn’t great, so one day we shut the door to pick up the mattress and put a fitted sheet over the bottom of the box spring. The kitty clearly knew what we were up to, based on his panicked pawing and meowing on the other side of the door, and when we were done and finally opened the door, he ran right up to the edge of the bed, looked underneath, and made some very unhappy meows.

Before the pandemic, he would wait in the front window for us to arrive home each workday. One day, my wife arrived home and he wasn’t waiting for us. She went inside and he didn’t run up to greet her. She looked around and found him in front of the bathroom, where apparently the glass shower door had shattered during the day. He wouldn’t go in himself, but he wanted us to know that there was something wrong in that room so we could handle it.

Once we were testing the paint from some paint cans to figure out what went with which walls by putting some paint on some paper and letting it dry on the dining room table. Oskar apparently walked across it, as we found little kitty paw prints leading us to a kitty who clearly wanted to clean his back paws, but knew he shouldn't. While he normally hated having his paws touched, and he complained while we did it, he didn't squirm when we used wet paper towels to clean the paint off his paws. He trusted that we were helping him and put that over his discomfort with us touching his paws.

We got him one of those suction cup window seats so he could sun himself in the window of my wife’s office. Oskar was so clever that even though he could have easily made the jump, he must have recognized that it wasn’t particularly solid, and would instead look up at it and meow, thus asking my wife to put him on his seat. Having seen plenty of cats who would easily jump onto just about anything, Oskar almost never jumped on something that he wasn’t confident would hold him.

Of course, one time the window seat suction cups let him down...

When we would take him to the vet, he would complain in the car on the way there. But on the way home, he was perfectly quiet. He knew that whatever was going on at the vet was over and he was going home. More surprising, despite being indoor-only, he seemed to be familiar enough with the surrounding area that when we got close to home, his demeanor would change to be more excited.

He very clearly knew what surfaces he wasn’t allowed on, and would jump on them solely for attention. How do we know this? He would jump on things he was allowed on silently, but before jumping on something he wasn’t allowed on, he would loudly meow and announce himself. “HEY HUMANS, I’M ABOUT TO DO SOMETHING BAD. BETTER COME STOP ME!”

He worked out that if we sat at the table for breakfast, it was usually a workday, and he would park himself on the daybed in my wife’s office to wait for her while we ate. But if we sat on the couch for breakfast, it was a couch day, and he would sit with us on the couch.

And once my wife started working, then he'd get comfy to keep her company. I love this picture; he's so angelic.

If my wife was out at an event or yoga or something while I stayed home, I’d come upstairs to meet her when she got home. Oskar would come with me and would look out the window because he understood that I knew she was coming.

So much personality was packed into our kitty. He really loved us. When we’d come home, he’d greet us at the door, and then rub himself on whatever corners were nearby before running to rub against our legs and receive pets, then he’d run off to a corner again. (Every corner in this house has stains on it from his rubbing; he was always so happy.) Sitting with him on the couch, he would hide his face against one of our arms and then we’d have warm kitty breath on our arm as he snoozed.

Or he'd hide his own face while snoozing.

He’d come sit and purr with us all the time and follow us around the house. He’d press his head into whatever parts of us were available all the time. When we took a shower, he’d sit on the edge of the tub to keep us company as a shower buddy.

When my wife would read on the couch, Oskar would cuddle with her as a reading buddy.

We were able to communicate with him astonishingly well for a creature that couldn’t use words to talk with us. When we had to leave, we could communicate to him pretty effectively when we were coming home based on our actions. If we left the bedroom light and/or the main floor hallway light on, that was a sign we were coming home that same day, and he would sleep somewhere near the front door. If we gave him wet food on our way out the door, that was the sign that we weren’t coming home that day, and he’d sleep elsewhere. (We could see on the cameras.) When he would see the duffel bag come out, he would know we were leaving and sulk, so we’d often wait as long as possible to pack just to avoid making him unhappy.

We had so many names and descriptions for him.

• He was Oskar T. Kitty.
• He was King Kitty. (All hail King Kitty!)
• He was our adorbs kitty.
• He was a purrable kitty.
• He was the snooze-master kitty.
• He was the purr-master kitty.
• He was the lounge-master kitty.
• He was the crunch-master kitty. He had better portion control than we did, and would often leave treats behind to eat later on. But you'd hear his collar jingle against his bowl followed by crunching.
• He was a dreamy kitty. He'd get super comfy with us and then he'd be twitchy as he dreamed.
• He was the drinky kitty. He loved water as much as my wife does.
• He was a stretchy kitty. He's stretch his way to us when he first got up. First one front leg, then the opposite rear leg.
• He was the zippy kitty. When he got particularly energetic, he'd zoom from one end of the house, up or down the stairs, and to the other end.
• He was a basket-case kitty. When he was unhappy, or just wanted to feel comforted, he would often go into his basket.

• He was a camo kitty. He loved sitting and sleeping on things that were black like him, even if those things were uncomfortable. Once, I was looking for him and called all over the house... and found him sitting on next day's (black) pants in the bedroom, where I started.

• He was Kris Crinkles. He hated the sound of crinkling plastic, unless he was the one crinkling it, then he did it as much as he could.
• He was Vomitus. He had semi-frequent hairballs and we ended up cleaning up after them now and then.
• He was a kitty loaf, and boy would I like a slice. Also, where did the kitty-leggies go?

• He was purrific.
• He was a noise-maker kitty. If he found something that would make noise, he made that noise a lot.
• He was noise-tastic.
• He was Chomps McTeeth.
• He was the kitty on the ledge of forever. (Star Trek fans get the reference.)

• He was able to get comfy on the head of a pin.
• He was a kitty-ball, or a kitty-comma.

• He was a kitty lump. In this picture he's only a partial kitty lump, but he'd often bury himself under the covers of one of the beds, leaving just a breathing lump.

• He was a kitty alarm. He would run quickly if he thought someone besides us was trying to come into the house or coming nearby. The black blur flying by was a warning of incoming visitors or packages.
• He was our little addict. He loved Churu, which we took to calling "kitty crack." Every time we walked by the door of the room it was in (which was kept closed), he went up to it and stared up at the doorknob, because he knew how doors worked. We started calling it the "sacred door" and he lived in eternal hope that it would open.

• He was our kitty cat pal.
• He was the cuddliest co-worker.

• He was an ottoman kitty. If my wife was taking a bath and I was in the bedroom at my desk, he'd often be on the ottoman--which is the comfiest spot half-way between us.

• He was a couch kitty.

• He was an armrest kitty. He would often sit on the arm-rest of the couch.
• He was a beggar kitty. He loved his treats.
• He was sniffy the kitty. Sniff sniff. Snuff snuff. Snoof snoof.
• He was the investigation cat.

• He was an in-the-way kitty.
• He was kitty cross-paws.

• He was a cuteness kitty.
• He was a sweetness kitty.
• He was a love-ness kitty.
• He was a cuddles kitty.
• He was the softness kitty.
• He was the kitty that only loves.
• He was our loving angel.
• He was our sweet baby.

He’s so integrated into our lives that we’re going to have a really hard time moving forward. When the house had water damage a few years ago, we did some additional renovations, and one of the things we did was have a window added to our walk-out basement, and we made sure it had a deep enough ledge that he could sit on it, which he regularly did. We call it “the kitty’s window” and the security camera there is even labeled “Kittys Window.”

Every time we came upon black cat merch, we bought it. We own so much kitty merch. Black cat imagery is everywhere in this house. This is very much the Oskar fan club.

A few assorted stories and thoughts about our wonderful kitty:

He had the cutest kitty-cat ears, and kitty-cat nosey, and kitty-cat whiskers, and kitty-cat white tuft on his chest, and kitty cat tail, and he was so very, very soft and silky, all the time. And he was the shiniest black cat I've ever seen. He spent so much time on his coat and you could really tell.

When he wanted us, he would pick up his paw and pat-pat our legs. (If you’ve ever seen the beginning of Kiki’s Delivery Service, where Jiji pat-pats Kiki, it’s just like that.) He didn’t do this when we got him, but when we wanted him to come to us, we would pat-pat our laps. We think he learned it from us.

Shortly after we moved into this house, one day we found him sitting inside a plastic bag. I picked the bag up and carried him around in it a bit, and he was perfectly comfy and fine with it.

We had songs for him that we would sing. One that immediately comes to mind:

Sweet and special kitty,
Oskar is a sweet and special kitty,
He is so sweet,
And also special,
As sweet as a kitty can be.

And its variant:

Sweet and special Oskar,
Oskar is a sweet and special Oskar,
He is so sweet,
And also Oskar,
As sweet as an Oskar can be.

We came into the living room one day and found the front door hanging open. Whether he got it open (he knew how door handles worked) or we left it, we’re still not sure. But we went into a panic about where he might be. We found him on the back deck soaking up the sun. All he wanted was to sit in the sun.

Sometimes he would be following us with his head until he looked at us upside down. He really wanted to keep us in sight as much as possible.

One time, he jumped on the dining room table, where he knew he wasn’t allowed. Thinking himself clever, he hunkered down behind a piece of mail that was sitting on-end as if we couldn’t see him over and around it.

When we’d sit out on the deck, he would often sit right inside the deck door watching and waiting for us to come back in.

He had a particular mousey toy that he really loved. He didn’t like any other toy as much as that one. And he would fling it in the air several feet as he played with it. If we were sitting together on the couch, he would often feel the need to put on a show for us, very intentionally playing with his mousey and then looking at us to make sure we were paying attention. I think he knew very well how cute he was and played it up for us.

He loved dots and when the right lights were on and the fan running in the bedroom, he’d chase the barely visible dots across the edge of the bed. He had a laser pointer he loved as well, and we bought him a little disco ball to put in the living room window to create dots in the morning sun. But if the lights were out of his reach, he would do this complaining meow which we interpreted as "that's not fair! I can't get that!"

He liked hearing the sound of his own voice on the stairs, and sometimes when it was particularly annoying, I would threaten “cuddly-wuddles” which involved me running at him and, if I caught him, giving him hugs as he clearly was unamused.

Before we had books on top of the bookshelves, he used to jump on top and watch us from above. Looking over his domain.

If he didn’t know when we were coming home, he would sometimes sit and sleep right behind the front door so we couldn’t open it without waking him up. He wanted to know the moment we got back. He’d blink sleepily as he clumsily rubbed himself on things to tell us how happy he was that we were home.

He bathed almost constantly. Sometimes he would bathe for a full 45 minutes in one of our laps, or nearby.

If you interrupted him while he was bathing though, sometimes his tongue would remain sticking out for a minute while he figured out what was going on.

My wife has a shelving unit in the front window for plants; the middle shelf was kept open for Oskar to sit on, which he would often do in the morning when it was sunny there. He also loved sitting on the back of the couch against the window, with the drapes closed or open, to soak up the warmth.

If we opened the screen door or any of the screened windows, we would very quickly find the kitty sitting in front of them sniffing the fresh air.

We have motion lights on the stairs, and if we were downstairs at night and he was upstairs, we could see him coming as the lights activated on the stairs. Sometimes he would just peer around the corner at the bottom of the stairs to see what we were doing.

When my wife took baths, Oskar would come to drink from the “big water bowl.” He would very carefully get as close as he could to the water before drinking from it. She couldn't use bubble bath or bath salts or else he would be very offended. (He was smart enough to know he couldn't drink it.) We also left the faucet dripping in the utility sink in the laundry room and he would often have a very wet face. He drank almost as much water as my wife does.

EDIT (7/6): My sister sent a video she had of Oskar drinking from the upstairs bathroom sink. It was too adorable to not add to this post.

He could stretch out to be a very lengthy kitty. Sometimes on the couch, he’d sit between my legs and he would start at my feet and end at my lap. Oh, and he always demanded a blanket. Sometimes he'd pat-pat and look, as if to say, "where's your blanket?" Then once you got one, he'd make his way onto my lap.

His previous owner had him declawed (we would not have done it), but he compensated with his teeth. I’d play with him frequently on the edge of the bed and he’d use his paws to try to drag my hand to his mouth, and sometimes he really got me. He was so much fun. But if he wasn’t extremely excited and I was playing more gently, he would give my hand gentle love-bites and then immediately lick the spot he had bitten.

Sometimes when I woke up in the morning, he’d be sitting on my pillow right above my head. Or be at the foot of the bed between my wife’s legs. Or he’d hear me get out of bed and come running in from just outside and then lead me to the restroom.

He loved to be hugged on our shoulders. He'd purr and look around and the other of us would pet him. Also, in this picture, you can see a stack of newspapers that he loved to sit on. Those papers sat there for several years.

In the evenings, he would try to keep us on schedule and lead us toward the bedroom as we got close to bedtime. Or if we were lazing in bed in the morning, try to get us out of bed to start our day, unless he also wanted to cuddle.

He was very polite; he generally wouldn’t eat food that wasn’t offered to him (he loved seafood-flavored kitty foods and treats), and would sometimes wait for an invitation before joining us on the bed or the couch. More than once I’d be at my desk and my wife would be behind me in bed. She’d ask where he was, and I’d look over and he was sitting patiently on the floor next to the bed. I’d say to invite him, she’d call his name and pat-pat, and he’d immediately jump on the bed to go see her.

His favorite place was between us. If we were standing next to each other and he was lounging somewhere, he’d often get up and place himself right between us. He’d often sit on the couch between us, or lounge in the kitchen when we were cooking to be near us both. And we couldn’t go to bed at night without visits from the kitty. He’d come, park himself on my shoulder between us, and purr as we gave him pets and scritch-a-scratches. He loved being scratched under his chin and on his cheeks. After a few minutes, he’d leave to do his rounds (we’d hear him walking around elsewhere in the house) and purr as he left, as if to say, I don’t want to go, but I have to go check on things to make sure our home is safe. I’d always say he was a kitty who took his responsibilities seriously; our kitty security guard. Afterward, he’d come back for more time with us as we went to sleep.

Last year, my wife’s workplace ran a contest to determine who their “pet ambassadors” for the coming year would be. Oskar won the cat category, and thus is the sitting cat ambassador. (I’m unclear whether or not there’s a succession plan.)

He was perfection in the form of a kitty.

I’m going to miss our wonderful angel kitty. He loved us so much and we loved him too. If we were designing a kitty custom for us, I’m not sure we could have done a better job, and it was pure chance that brought him into our lives. He brought so much joy into our lives, and now it’s so quiet in the house without either him talking to us or us talking to or about him. It’s so unfair, and neither of us can believe we’re never going to see him or pet him again. I don’t know what we’re going to do without him.

When the kitty would snub my attempts to coax him into my lap, I'd do a big dramatic complaint about how my lap was a "kitty-free zone." Now the whole house is. If you're reading this and have any pets, please give them a hug for us. I want nothing more than to hug my kitty.

Good-bye, baby kitty. We miss you and we love you.