Family Photos Smeared Curbside

I have found a large number of old family photos at thrift shops, online auctions, and occasionally even on the street. Photos found on the street tend to be small in quantity, and probably just dropped or absent-mindedly mishandled. This scattered mess of family photos and other items smeared across a sidewalk curb tore at me for its deliberateness. Someone must have badly wanted to exorcise from their memory something, if not everything about the family seen in these photos, and they felt no compunction about the materials being found and the people in the images possibly even being identified. Photos, shoeboxes, DVD cases, even a tiny flip-flop littered this relatively untrafficked street in Long Island City, Queens, only for a short time. I considered collecting the photos and piecing together the story behind what might have led someone to do this but I had nothing in which to carry any of these pieces when I took these photos. I revisited this spot the next day intending to salvage a few items but by then everything was gone. These photos originally appeared at http://sorabji.com/pictures/Discarded_Family_Photo_Album/.