When John at Lifeboat Farm pointed to “Amazing Pictures, Pollution in China” in his Twitter stream, I certainly was appalled. We all know that cheap imported goods are, well, too cheap. Given the cost of the materials and transportation alone, any thinking person can figure that something doesn’t add up. The costs that aren’t passed along to us in the price are the costs of environmental mayhem and human slavery.

It’s easy to look at a web site and agree how terrible things are. Putting that acknowledgment into practice is a much more difficult thing.

I ran smack into this dilemma in my quest for a bed. I’d been sleeping on a thermarest and pile of other bedding on the floor for almost a week. It finally dawned on me that if I handled the chore of finding a bed, I wouldn’t have to wake up in pain. I’d been watching Craigslist, of course, but was having trouble finding something decent nearby. I don’t have a truck, so this added to the anxiety of the search.

On Saturday, I decided to look at one last Craigslist bed in San Rafael, and if that didn’t work, I’d just drive on to Ikea and get something there. I was encouraged by the package dimensions listed on the Ikea web site…I could actually get a low-end bed frame and mattress and fit it into the car, or on the roof rack, and have room left over for Laika Lou, who isn’t quite ready for a five-hour midday stay alone.

But those photos from China bothered me. I couldn’t tell for sure where these things from Ikea were made. And I knew that buying something used just felt better to me. I wasn’t depriving myself…a good used bed from Craigslist would undoubtedly be better than a similarly priced new bed from Ikea. It was just the hassle of it all…dealing with people instead of a faceless company, and having to ask for help in getting it home. Asking for help…that’s a tough one for me, and I’ve had to ask for a LOT of help in the past few months.

The Craigslist bed turned out to look pretty good. Real wood, with storage drawers underneath. Still, it was tempting to just pass and go to Ikea and be done with it. And I almost did.

But those photos…it wasn’t just the difference between one object in a store versus an object on Craigslist. It was a whole way of thinking. Now, my friends are not judgmental people….but I knew which choice they would be happy support. My community believes recycling and reuse. We believe that it makes a difference where are goods come from and how they’re produced.

And I had friends in that community who’d offered the use of their truck before. And so I asked for help yet again, some beautiful people responded with an immediate “yes”. Meet Tony and Daria, of Sanders Field Farm:

I borrowed the truck, and got an awesome bed. And it was a decision that will even let me sleep at night.

It made me realize how much supporting others in our community can make a bigger difference than we think. When they offered me the truck, my friends weren’t trying to make an socially conscious shopping decision. But their “doing good” helped me do better. That makes a real difference. That’s the power of community, helping us all reach a higher level of conscious living.