Jim Sinisi’s wife said the world is “a dimmer place” now that her husband is not in it.
“He was a once-in-a-lifetime kind of person,” said Susan Sinisi of her husband, a musician in the band Wordy Bums.
Only two weeks shy of his 38th birthday, Jim was driving in Howard Beach on Saturday, November 30, just before 1 a.m., when James Celauro, 23, of Ozone Park, crashed into him on 159th Avenue and 98th Street.
Celauro, who cops say had been drinking, is charged with vehicular manslaughter and DWAI, or driving while ability impaired, police said.
Susan had gone to sleep for the night in their Glendale home and was awakened at 3:05 a.m. by a phone call from a nurse at Jamaica Hospital.
“They told me Jimmy had been in a fairly significant car crash,” she said. “It was like my temperature dropped, my insides turned toxic and I couldn’t stop shaking.”
Susan and her mother-in-law went to the hospital, holding hands all the way.
“And I’m praying. I don’t go to church too much, but I’m praying to God that Jimmy is just physically broken,” she said. “I would wait on him hand and foot and take care of him until he was mended. I felt like so much of who is he is, is his intellect and his soul and how he writes.”
Photo courtesy of Susan Sinisi
Jim was with friends in Lindenwood before the crash, his wife said.
“He was the essence of Queens,” said Rjae Izm, Wordy Bums drummer.
Susan said her husband, a native of Woodhaven, was a “crazy, poetic, fiery, beautiful artist.”
“He was just never, ever dull,” she said. “Always fun to be with, super creative and super into creating. He was brilliant.”
Now, Wordy Bums, for which Susan sings back-up, wants to take on the projects that their fallen bandmate left unfinished.
“Jim was the nucleus, the catalyst, the engine. The Wordy Bums can never be the same without such an integral part of this machine,” the band said in a Facebook post. “We are truly blessed to have shared the stage with him and witness true talent.”
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