Good for you for sticking to your guns. The most tiresome part of Medium (to me) is the seeming requirement that our stories have no worth unless they include lessons.

Humor is the only topic that is exempt.

Even creative nonfiction writers who should know better have fallen under the spell, until almost every submission I get at Indelible Ink, no matter the subject, has the requisite lesson tacked on.

The worst is "Do you blah, blah, blah?" Completely kills the mood. But someone somewhere along the line has told them that's the way to appeal to readers.

No. It's not. THIS is the way you appeal to readers. You write something they can be immersed in until the very end.

I'm happy to see it in The Writing Cooperative, though I'm frankly surprised. Happily surprised. Our writing doesn't always have to be in the form of a lecture in order to get our points across.