Mike Arnone,Weichert Realtors Clayton,CA

New For Sale! 5519 Merritt Dr., Concord, CA - $990,000 - Imagine Summer BBQ's and Winter Nights in your Hot Tub outside your 1st floor Master Suite! Contact Mik...e Arnone - 925-212-1503 View your expansive home - https://summer-anderson-photography.seehouseat.com/1624094 #ilovemyhome #ConcordLiving #ilovemyagent #eastbayhome All Entrants Notice - https://www.car.org//All-Entrants-Notice-and-Pictogram-Sig

Waiting for just the right buyer!

Now is the time to live in the house of your dreams...look at this magnificent home in a forestry splendor...Call me for a private showing...

WoW...the generosity of loving people.

Chapter 15 Master of the Waterways...God of the Creeks by Michael Arnone Vincenti introduced with Brother Pablo on a long ride... Chapter 15 When the juvenile bull kill the Guernsey’s calf, farmer frugality wasted nothing. With God’s blessing, the careless death bequeathed Rosa a rare opportunity. I found the animal last night, Manuel said. So today, my wonderful Rosa, sad for the loss but thankful for the gift, prepared for us, her famous veal and noodle dish. Rosa smiled. That’s right! Otherwise, the little cow would be mooing for its mother’s milkand all you gluttons would only have frijoles to eat. Amid nut and fruit bowls, the praise subsided and the group gathered in the usual places ready for storytelling. For listeners to bear witness, Pablo held up his journalindeed, the very same keepsake given by Mama Dolores. He opened it to the page entitled Brothers Traveling North, and resumed the telling. As you can seemy writing is in excellent hand, telling all the stories we shared along the way. I pray this day to day record brings to life the long journey Vincenti and I traveled from Rancho de Leon in Mexico, to Rancho Piedra Blanca. It is written honoring Mama Dolores’s request for me to record our journey’s events so she and Don Joaquin could relive our many adventures.’ You will discover, as our parents did, my many curious notations of Vincenti’s growing apprehension and fear, the closer time came to meeting Annabella. Since his intimacy with females was limited to two chaperoned church gatherings, any his experience with the senoritas, you see, had yet to happen. Drawing on his ever present pipe, Pablo smiled, looking back on his youth. I, on the other hand, rode often into the villages of my boyhood. I often visited my many ‘sisters,’ those daughters to the mothers who nursed me as their own. Caring and generous, thanks to them, they taught me many things about women. And because they loved me so much, I became much more than a brother to them all. But my poor brother Vincenti, so many times on our long ride he asked me over and over again, ‘Pablo, what should I say to her? I do not know the words. I have none of your confidence. What do I do?’ I reassured him, when the time came, the right words would pour from his mouth. I did caution him, however with women you must always act like a man. Real women will never respect a mere boy. Bolstering him, I painted a picture how it was done. ‘Be like a bull, Vincenti. Be strong, courageous, without fear. Think of yourself as a great red Cabrera bull, standing high on top of a hillGazing in the meadows belowYou see a beautiful heiferShe is temptingYou desire herSlowly you stroll toward her and she lingers waiting for you and you whisper in her ear.’ ‘AndAnd?’ Vincenti begged. And I would answer ‘She is yours of course. My little brother that is how it is done.’ ‘But Pablo, what do I whisper in her ear?’ Disgusted, I would spur my horse and ride away. Manuel smiled at Rosa raising his eyebrows toward their bedroom. The look of disgust on her face quickly turned to a temptress grin, giving Manuel promise he was on to something. Like a noose tightening around his neck, with the passing of each mile bringing him closer to the day he would meet his bride, anxiety choked my poor brother. With no confidence and less experience, he relied unreservedly on gifts he carried as his only hope to impress Annabella. With her seventeenth birthday less than a month away, Vincenti prayed the gold earrings he kept for good luck in his vest pocket, would speak for him in thunderous ways. Exquisitely crafted, the earrings matched perfectly the wedding locket he planned to present to her at the wedding altar. Through two centuries de Leon tradition passed the prophetic wedding locket on to its newest bride. It possessed a secret revealed only if the wife’s death preceded her husband’s. Senor Pablo, Conchita wondered. In all those many years of marriages, has no de Leon discovered the locket’s secret? Reaching for a freshly peeled orange Pablo set the journal down. Conchita, there is much proof of toil and blood every de Leon husband had at one time or another,attempted to learn the locket’s secret. None were successful and everyone of those husbands died before their wife’s death. Preceding Annabella, twelve de Leon brides including Mama Dolores, took possession of the locket at the wedding altar. Everyone of them lived to pass the locket on to the next bride. I would often tell Vincenti‘I prayed for your sake and mine, Annabella never comes to know the locket’s secret. If she does that would mean there are no brides left to inherit the locket, and the brother who tortures me would be too dead to ask any more questions. The irony did not escape the listeners. To this very day the secret of the locket remains an enigma. The locket remains in possession of Annabella, the thirteenth bride and since she is the last bride to join the de Leon family, the secret dies with her. When Jose returned from his brief outhouse visit, Pablo resumed the story of the de Leon brother’s long journey from Mexico to their arrival at San Miguel. Seven years after Alphonse de Leon died, when Vincenti and I were eighteen years old, , we trailed on horseback north from Mexico City to Central California, to begin our long tenure at Rancho Piedra Blanca. Blessed with good weather for most of the way, the mild winter allowed us to ride into the courtyard of Mission San Miguel mid June 1881, two weeks earlier than we had planned. A small boy greeted us at the Presidio entry. ‘Senor, welcome to the Mission. From where have you come?’ I dismounted tying my horse at the water trough. We sought first, following Don Joaquin’s instructions, Friar Fray Tomas Sepulveda, the recipient of the introduction letters he posted months before our departure from Rancho de Leon. ‘We are from very far awaynow run to Friar Sepulveda and inform him that Vincenti de Leon and his brother Pablo seek his hospitality.’ ‘Hurry niño,’ Vincenti shouted after him. ‘We are tired and very hungry.’’’ I can still smell the masa harina baking in the nearby hearth. Whetting our famished appetites, the aroma filled the courtyard. The grinding mill was quiet and at its base, several squaw squatted in a circle stripping corn husks into a large straw basket, gossiping about the strangers just arrived. With the noon sun burning hot and sticky, the winds from the southwest that rode with us from Santa Maria, stoked the humid breeze. Looking at the water our horses were splashing in the trough, I dreamed of a long soothing. ‘It is midday, Pablo. We haven’t eaten anything but a bite of jerky all day and you are thinking about a bath and cleaning the outside of your smelly body. For this last month the jerky made me sick. I prayed the Franciscans feed us soon, or I will be forced to raid the courtyard ovens.’ At noon, the Angelus rang out. Children of every age came running out of the sacristy of the adobe church followed by a tall, skinny priest who walked briskly after them toward the orange orchard. He stopped noticing us watering the horses. With a voice resonating from deep within his slender frame, he said, ‘Welcome to Mission San Miguel.’ Every syllable he uttered, every sound he made, I swear emerged from a bottomless well. ‘Buenos Dias, amigos, I am Friar Philippe. Has Friar Sepulveda been informed that you are here?’ ‘Please excuse us Padre,’ Vincenti begged. ‘Our father is Don Joaquin de Leon, I am Vincenti de Leon, and this is my brother Pablo. We have ridden from Mexico City these last six months to take up residence on our family Rancho Piedra Blanca. ‘We believe the good Friar Sepulveda has been expecting us for several months.’ Vincenti pointed in the direction of the little boy, ‘and a niño has run to let the Friar know we are here.’ Anticipating the magnificent basso profundity of his voice, I asked, ‘Are you a teacher of the children?’ He laughed. ‘On the contrary, gentlemen. They are teaching me. Can you not feel their joy? The good Lord, Himself dances in their souls.’ For a moment, he watched the kids at play, then prayed, ‘Why can we not remain children like them? I am afraid it is much too difficult to be a man.’ Singing the Angus Dei in the deepest octave, he bowed, and hurried off joining the children. ‘Pablowe have just heard singing for us, the Angel of God. In all my days I do not think I will ever be so close to heaven, as I am right now. Friar Fray Tomas Sepulveda joined us. ‘Yes every day we praise the Lord for Friar Philippe’s magnificent instrumentThe Friars of San Miguel believe his voice is the eternal bass long awaited by heaven’s choir.’ Forty years before Vincenti and I arrived, Padre Fray Tomas met a younger version of our grandfather. And like his grandsons, Alphonse de Leon surely welcomed the fabled hospitality of the Franciscan Fathers, historically bestowed on all travelers of the El Camino Real. ‘Since your father’s letter arrived, the Mission has awaited the day his sons would ride into our Presidio. I pray your journey has been rewarding.’ Vincenti exclaimed, ‘The trail was kind but we are bursting with excitement to see Piedra Blanca. ‘As your grandfather did before you, I am sure you will delight in the Rancho magnificence. But come now, and please join the other Friars at our midday meal. You must be starving. Miguel will care for the animals. After you rest, there will be time enough to ask questions and discuss many things.’ Young Miguel took the reins and led our horses to the Mission stables. Anticipating home cooking and the coolness of the adobe walls, we walked toward the priory, until the Friar, drawing pictures from his memory, stopped to study me. ‘Yesyes. You are taller than your grandfather Alphonse. But it is easy to see that you are a de Leon. Take off your hat. Let me look at you more closely.’ Embarrassed for the old priest, I immediately bowed in respect and whispered to the Friar. ‘I beg your indulgences Padre, but your sentiments surely are intended for my brother Vincenti. He has the de Leon blood coursing through his veins. I am just the adopted orphan.’ The Friar’s face flushed a burning red. ‘Please excuse an old man,’ he pled. ‘My eyes are constantly betraying me.’ he laughed at himself. ‘It is good the mind can still admit the mistake.’ Pointing to each of us in turn, he righted the ship. ‘Please forgive your priest. You are Vincentiand you are Pablo. I am sure I will get that right.’ Then he turned and led us silently to the dining room. Seated among priests and brothers, I tried to soothe a seething Vincenti. Making a joke, I laughed, and said. ‘Do not take offense with the old man. After all our parents said we might as well be twins.’ But still, Vincenti fumed. The meal was filling. The soup, bread, some wine and cheese, accompanying the fried chicken and spinach was a gift from the Lord and so very welcomed after days and days of hard tack and jerky. After lunch we rested in priory guest rooms. Friar Tomas hurried to his office to read again Don Joaquin’s letter sent almost a year before. Reading it again and again, his confusion only deepened. ******************** The evening turned cool and damp, yet a full moon, shining brightly through the Friar’s window, reflected blurred images on a stained glass canister resting on the pedestal next to his desk. We sat in his office overlooking the courtyard, waiting for the Padre’s return from vespers. I toyed with an ancient relic labeled Saint Peter’s shin bone, laying naked on an ornate table covered with maps. The bone acted as a paper weight and I quickly returned it to its proper place at the sound of Vincenti’s irritation. ‘Why are we here listening to this old man? He knows nothing that can help us. He is not even aware who I amI mean, who we are. ‘I love you brother, but all this talk about you and my grandfather and the resemblance’ ‘I know, I know,’ trying to cut him off. ‘It is annoying. But his misspoken word is not what is bothering you, Vincenti. Tomorrow for the very first time, you meet Annabella. You are flustered and nervous. What you are feeling is not anger for a careless old man.’ Pushing himself up by the armrest, Vincenti jumped from his chair, his face a bright red. His pacing reminded me of a bull about to charge. ‘Take it easy amigo, you are going to burst.’ ‘It is easy for you to say Pablo. It is not you who is pledged in this stupid marriage. I have never met this girl, and everyone expects me to be the perfect gentleman. ‘ I’d rather be riding a wild stallion than meeting her. What if she doesn’t like me? What if I don’t like her?’ Then the crimson of his face paled to yellow. I try to console him saying at a time that should be filled with great joy, he was making this a very uncomfortable situation. ‘Is it not wonderful to know what lies ahead in one’s life, to have it before you like a brilliant map showing you where to find the treasures? ‘I, for one, am very envious that your life is so well planned by parents who love you very much and want only the best for you. My brother, you are in possession of a great gift.’ Still, vexation continued. Seeing him in such distress, I made Vincenti an offer that would haunt me for the rest of my life. ‘If it would ease your mind let me help you tomorrow. Maybe it would be best if I met Annabella first. You knowbearing a formal invitation from you to meet for the first timesetting the place and time. That will put you in control, and show her you are a very decisive yet considerate man.’ ‘She doesn’t have any idea you are here yet, so I can smooth out the trail for you, so to speak, and give her an opportunity to ready herself. ‘Who knows? Perhaps she feels the same way you do. Remember, you know nothing at all about Annabella, and she knows very little about you.’ ‘You would do that for me?’ Vincenti chimed. ‘Oh, Pablo you would meet her, and talk to her, and do these things for me?’ ‘Listen little brother, this is nothing. We have traveled very far and done many things from our boyhood times to the long journey just completed. ‘This is just a little thing I do this to show my gratitude for all you have done for me.’ Finally his anger was gone. The meeting that followed with Friar Fray Tomas went well. And we all agreed that I would carry the introductory invitation to Annabella at Rancho Canada de los Osos the next morning. Their first meeting would be an intimate dinner hosted by Friar Sepulveda at the Presidio one week later, inviting Annabella, her parents and brothers, to join the groom to be and me. When the meeting ended the Friar hurried back to his quarters. He kept to himself the disappointing news about Annabella, Vincenti and I would come to know soon enough.

1. top photo...Mom & Dad with New 1958 Ford Fairlane 2. middle photo...This one is the mother lode...Uncle Carmen, Aunt Florence, Aunt Marge, Art & Tina Norton,... Dave & Anna, Babe and ? who is that guy? and who are the two babies? first with Aunt Marge and the other sitting on the ground 3.Anthony Arnone in his prime 4.This one is rare...Uncle Hugo, Uncle Joe & Aunt Marge and the swimmer...who is that? See more

Thanks to all for a Great Open House Yesterday & Today 400 Marna Drive Vacaville, CA ... Lots of Buyers and Agents Through the Home. They like it a lot... Hope to look at offers this week as they come in See more

Cream Puff...You have been waiting for. OPEN HOUSE SUNDAY 29TH 1-4 PM Offered at $449,900... 400 Marna Drive Vacaville, CA Buyers Have Been Waiting For This Doll House!!! 1 Story/Cream Puff in Perfect Move In Condition...1382 Sq Ft Floor Plan Meticulously Maintained, On A Generous 6678 Square Foot Lot. 3BRs & 2 Baths, Master Suite + 2 Jr BRs + Guest Bath. Tile Kitchen, Gas Stove/Oven,Dishwasher Breakfast Bar, Dining Room & Family Room w/Fireplace. Mirage Hardwood Floors. W/W Carpet in BR's. Inside Laundry. Private Bk Yard, Covered Patio, Newer Fences. A 10 X 12 Outbuilding Workshop/Storage/-4th BR. Forced Air Heating/AC Plus Whole House Fan. Newer 50 YR Roof, Painted Inside & Out. Dual Pane Windows. New Front Door & Security Screen Door. Tile Entry. Window Coverings Stay Except Sheers & Rods in Family Room. Roomy 2 Car Garage w/Auto Door and Off Street Parking. Easy Side Yard Access. Desirable Travis School District. Great Home In A Great Neighborhood. Call Mike Arnone Weichert Realtors BRE # 00767212 925-212-1503

Big Open House Today 1 to 4 PM

Cream Puff...You have been waiting for. OPEN HOUSE SUNDAY 29 1-4 PM Offered at $449,900... 400 Marna Drive Vacaville, CA Buyers Have Been Waiting For This Doll House!!! 1 Story/Cream Puff in Perfect Move In Condition...1382 Sq Ft Floor Plan Meticulously Maintained, On A Generous 6678 Square Foot Lot. 3BRs & 2 Baths, Master Suite + 2 Jr BRs + Guest Bath. Tile Kitchen, Gas Stove/Oven,Dishwasher Breakfast Bar, Dining Room & Family Room w/Fireplace. Mirage Hardwood Floors. W/W Carpet in BR's. Inside Laundry. Private Bk Yard, Covered Patio, Newer Fences. A 10 X 12 Outbuilding Workshop/Storage/-4th BR. Forced Air Heating/AC Plus Whole House Fan. Newer 50 YR Roof, Painted Inside & Out. Dual Pane Windows. New Front Door & Security Screen Door. Tile Entry. Window Coverings Stay Except Sheers & Rods in Family Room. Roomy 2 Car Garage w/Auto Door and Off Street Parking. Easy Side Yard Access. Desirable Travis School District. Great Home In A Great Neighborhood. Call Mike Arnone Weichert Realtors BRE # 00767212 925-212-1503