The cat is a wise one. She doesn’t have any deep loves and doesn’t let anyone make a slave of her.

In her entry from December 29, 1958, Carolina writes of a cat that has killed a rat she’s been trying to catch for days. In the cat, Carolina sees the value she prizes most in herself: independence. By ascribing a lack of “deep loves” to the animal, Carolina reveals one of her own survival strategies: she refuses to get married or put her love interests before the interests of her children. As she describes it, marriage resembles slavery. Having watched the women around her get beaten by their husbands, she decides that violence and subservience are givens within marriage. In a larger sense, Carolina is deeply ambivalent about putting her trust in anyone but herself. In the desperate world of the favela, every man or woman must fend for him- or herself. The cat represents the characteristic that allows Carolina to survive in the favela: self-reliance.