In the opening scene of Waiting to Begin Patricia O'Donnell speaks to incoming students at a university, telling of her transformation from a rebellious young woman to the writer and professor standing before them. Pat feels the story is not wholly true however, that some of the professor was in the younger woman, and that there is "something of that young woman--lawless, braless, rude and exuberant--in me now." Here's the real story, she writes...