Oreo Ambitions

• hydrate it by drinking lots of water

• eat dark chocolate and blueberries and walnuts and salmon and other foods high in antioxidants!!

• play little brain games on your phone; I like wordconenct! anything that makes you think!

• read books. It’s simple but necessary. Even better - join a book club, or read with a friend, so you can have discussions after. This will improve your reading comprehension.

• do puzzles - it doesnt have to be sudoku, I love playing Beat Saber on the Oculus Rift because it makes my brain have to match colorful patterns to physical movements very quickly!

• learn a new dance - even a tik tok trendy dance. Learning new dance moves are proven to strengthen synapses!!

• go bird watching, or foraging, or anything outdoors that requires you to explore pattern recognition and visual searching

• watch a movie with the intent of analysis - this is best done with a cinephile friend!! talk about tropes and symbolism and character growth

• cross stitch, or sew, or do anything that requires matching nimble hand movements to patterns

• play or learn an instrument!

• develop a consistent sleep schedule (or as close to consistent as you can get!)

• when eating, try to identify the ingredients and flavors you’re perceiving!

Kara Zor-El is sprawled beneath a willow tree in a rather un-ambassadorlike manner, hair tousled from this morning's flight, skin flushed. Her eyes are closed, but she isn't sleeping; she's listening to the way the wind moves across the meadow, through the branches above, and down the hill to the Luthor house. This, she thinks, is her third favorite thing about Earth: that her senses here are so sharp she can hear things as subtle as the shape and trajectory of a breeze. It's also the most challenging, and the last six weeks at the Luthor estate have been an exercise in extreme self control and sensory exhaustion. Kara can feel, see, smell, taste, hear everything and it never stops and she doesn't always or even often have the capacity or the time to stop and filter it all out. Kal says it will get easier, but everything is easy for Kal. Add it to the list of things about which Kara is trying not to feel bitter.

Since it isn't easy for her, and since today is the only day she can reasonably expect to have to herself for the next week or so, she's gone flying and now she's meditating - or something similar to it - and hoping that her thoughts will quiet as she filters out the sounds of the world one by one until the auditory input she's receiving is almost normal. She doesn't need to hear that bird picking at the dirt, or the clatter of cutlery in the kitchen down the hill, or-

Lena Luthor is walking up the hill towards the willow tree. Kara's efforts to feel normal for a moment immediately cease - she would know the rhythm of those footfalls anywhere, even in her sleep. And - yes, and the brother. Kara holds very still now, keeps her breathing measured and deep. She would give nearly anything to steal another few minutes with Lena, but not in front of the Luthor heir. Something about that man makes her skin prickle.

"And after that," he's saying, "You'll head to Krypton for the remainder of the year. I'm assured the ship will be comfortable but I'm sure you'll be too, ah, busy with Kal-El to care, so long as the sleeping arrangements are adequate."

Lena says nothing. Kara listens to the steady beat of her heart, fast now though whether from anger or from the climb up the hill she couldn't say. She listens to the subtle brush of skin against skin, and she pictures the way Lena rubs at her own hands when there's something she knows she can't say. The two Luthors are cresting the hill now, and any moment-

"Oh," Lena says softly. "Lex-"

"Ah," Lex sneers. His disdain is loud, loud, loud to Kara's ears. "I was wondering where she got off to. Probably day drinking, by the look of it."

"Kryptonians can't-" Lena begins to say, but Lex isn't listening. He's already turned away towards the path into the woods, leaving Kara to sleep off whatever it is he thinks she's gotten into. She really truly isn't drunk. Lena has the right of it; Kara probably can't get drunk off of anything in this solar system even if she were the kind of person who'd like to. But, she supposes, if that's what Lex makes of her strange behavior when she's overwhelmed or confused then, well, that's what he thinks. She's unlikely to change his mind.

Unfortunate, then, that Kara will be here with him, serving as Kypton's ambassador for the year while Lena is on Krpyton. With Kal. 'Busy' making an alliance in the form, hopefully, of a hybrid child. Because everything is easy for Kal - and especially everything that Kara wants for herself.

Lex is saying something about the alliance and the wedding but for once Kara is having no trouble drowning out the sound of his voice. She's listening intently to Lena where she's stopped some twenty feet away: to her heart, her breath, the sweep of her tongue across her bottom lip. She's listening, too, to her own self pity - not that she would admit as much out loud. And then, to her surprise, Lena speaks, so softly that anyone but Kara might have missed it.

"I'm sorry," Lena whispers. "I wanted it to be you."

Kara holds very, very still, the deep breathing of feigned sleep forgotten in her surprise. Then, hesitant, she opens her eyes.