And then, about five minutes later, it happened. We heard screaming coming from the front of the line. It took a few minutes for the noise to permeate our jetlagged brains. We turned to watch. It was the same woman. She was arguing with a cabby. Apparently this cabby was requiring her, unlike all the other travelers being picked up, to pay for her trip home in advance.

Newark's taxi system works like this. You find the taxi line and stand in it for an interminable amount of time. When you finally reach the front, the dispatcher asks where you're going and gives you a yellow form with the amount of the travel bill. For Denise and I, it was $45. When you're delivered home, you're supposed to pay the cabby the amount on the yellow form, plus tolls, plus any tip.

But this particular cabby wanted this particular woman to pay in advance. And suddenly, she was transformed from a tired business traveler learning about Notes administration into a second class citizen. She was so upset. You could see this touched a chord in her, because as the debate raged (eventually to include the cabby, some workers from the taxi stand, and even a Newark airport cop), she got progressively more angry and hurt.

Denise and I did nothing. We just stood there. Denise had an expression of shock on her face. I was a mere spectator. The entire event didn't fully register. I just wanted to go home. Part of me was even annoyed that this was taking place because it was keeping me from getting to my cab as quickly as I wanted.

But as I sat stalled in traffic the next day, motoring three hours to meet my family for Thanksgiving dinner, the scene replayed itself in my mind's eye. Apparently, the recording camera operating somewhere in my cerebellum was substantially more functional at the airport than the rest of my mind, because I could recall the entire scene with almost crystal clarity.

I could recall what she was wearing. I could see clearly the bright green and muted brown colors of her clothing and even the fire-engine red of the book. I could recall her shoes, her coat, and even how it hung on her frame. But most of all, vividly, I could recall, I could see in my mind, the despair showing in her eyes. Outwardly, there was fury. This was a woman who was unjustly insulted. But inwardly, she was hurting terribly. And I keep seeing her eyes.

There's a lot we don't know. We don't know whether she was singled out because she was an African American woman, whether it was because of where she wanted to go, or for some other reason. Most probably, she was singled out for this treatment by the immigrant cabby with a thick accent because she was a black woman.

I spend most of my time in relative isolation from the real world. If I live anywhere, it's on the Internet, where faces and, in particular, eyes can't be seen. Yet here I was, immersed in absolute reality, where a stranger was being hurt. But she wasn't a stranger. She was a Notes administrator. She may have been someone who sent me mail. She may have been someone who was at Lotusphere last year with me. She may well have been one of our readers. She was one of us.