A Memoir of Kid Logic, Cheetah Speed, and YouTube Lies
Setting: August 2025 — Fact-checking the dinner table
“Baby cheetahs can run 27 miles per hour,” Holden announced between bites of dinner, as if he’d just returned from the savannah himself. “Kid cheetahs run about 100. Adult cheetahs, 305. And old adults, 313.”
He rattled off the numbers with absolute authority, fork in one hand, wild facts in the other. We nodded along, letting him build his animal kingdom of speed, mile by impossible mile.
About fifteen minutes later, I circled back. “Hey Holden—what were those cheetah speeds again?”
This time the confidence cracked. He hesitated, stumbled, then shrugged. “I don’t remember. Just look it up.”
So I did. Actual cheetahs top out around 50 to 80 mph.
“Where’d you hear yours?” I asked.
“YouTube,” he said, dead serious. Then he leaned back in his chair like a man who had solved the world already: “YouTube always lies.”
This post is part of my One-Minute Memoir series — short reflections on small moments that still manage to say something big.
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