Yes, people can write like those two without writing as well as they did.
The point is to practice editing your flow of words as you write and revise, trimming out everything that isn't absolutely necessary and potent. My comment was a response to your statement about the different styles in which you can write. I was suggesting you try one that people might like a bit more. A lot of people have been chiming on on your writing style (mean, but it's BARF), and dude... you're verbose. From what I've read in here, your style bugs people as much as the truthfulness of the content. You're like the anti-Hemingway, when it comes to style. This is coming from someone who had the same disease. So if you want to be a good writer, and I think you do, I'll say it again: Try writing like Hemingway and Carver. The style WILL rub off. I promise. Then later, your own writing will benefit from being sharper and more focused.
Everything you said makes sense, and is logical. The trouble is I never wrote anything in Cold Shower or out of it for other's entertainment or impression. The fact that some others were engaged in some way with the story was a happy and completely unexpected byproduct.
In a forum filled with unique individuals it doesn't sound reasonable in many ways when there is such anger about me not writing like someone else, or acting in a way they expect. In truth, if Cold Shower read even remotely like "a story" that was a coincidence. It was a work of personal ranting that just happened to be longer and have more punctuation than normal.
There's that saying that the rain falls on the just and unjust alike. I've thought about this. What comes to my mind is that those who like Cold Shower do so because they recognize what parts of their lives it reminds them of, and those that hate it and the way I did it also recognize parts of their own lives, but those thoughts trigger anger.
Cold Shower is a badly written NEUTRAL piece, and like a gun, it carries every connotation that people can imagine, good and bad.
No one here is petty, we all say things and do things for a specific reason. Because I can't understand what some of those reasons are I feel doesn't give me the right to condemn anyone. That's why I won't react in any way that doesn't lead to connection and at least an amiable exchange; that tack has a destination. Insult and personal attacks is an endless spiral of hurt and wasted effort.
