(John:) Good morning Hank, it's Tuesday.

So listen, in order to understand what's about to happen, we need to freeze, so that I can give you some context.

Woke up early in London, which is earlier back home, brushed my teeth, had a cup of coffee in the hotel lobby while admiring my Wimbledon shoes and then began the journey to Plough Lane.

So 22 years ago, the football club Wimbledon FC was stolen away from their community and moved to Milton Keynes.

This happens sometimes in American sports; the St. Louis Rams become the Los Angeles Rams, or whatever, because American sports teams are franchises, but it had never happened before in England, where sports teams are community assets.

Supporters of Wimbledon had to start over, this time with an amateur team, owned by its fans. At the beginning, they had no stadium, no uniforms, no staff and no players. But together, they rebuilt the club. They worked their way up the amateur divisions of English football before becoming a full-time professional team in 2011, and now, we are in the same league as Milton Keynes, the lot who stole our club.

In 2020, Wimbledon opened a magnificent new stadium at Plough Lane, a stadium paid for, and owned, by the fans, just like the club is.

But since making it back to professional football, Wimbledon have not generally been, uh, good - in fact no professional team in England has lost more games in the last five years. A related fact: only 4 of the 92 professional teams in England were profitable last year, and we were one of them, because we have to be. We have no rich owners to fund the teams, which now include a women's side and many youth teams.

But I don't care that we're perpetually underfunded and suffering. I'm in love, and when you're in love, you do weird things, like fly to England with your friend Stuart, just to cheer on the boys against the franchise currently plying its trade in Milton Keynes.

Many have called this game one of the fiercest rivalries in football, and the match was intense. I sang, and shouted myself hoarse. I was filled with dread: we'd never beaten Milton Keynes at home before in front of our fans. On the pitch, the Dons, some of whom had been with Wimbledon since they were 9 or 10, played their guts out, but after 90 minutes that were exhausting even to watch, there'd been 12 yellow cards, but no goals.

And then, in the last minute of the game, our friend Lex happened to be recording what they thought was the end of the game. But it wasn't the end.

(raucous cheering)

Here's how it sounded in the voice of our long-time commentator, Mikey T.

(Mikey T:) Back now to Reeves once again, stayed high and forward. Brown now with the opportunity, players queuing up in the centre. Oh, and it's a chance for Curtis (cheering) it's Ronan Curtis (cheering)

(John:) That ballboy is fine, by the way, he later said it was the best moment of his life. I wasn't even in my body, I was in some other place, some light-soaked plane of existence where all hope is rewarded. I mean, look at it, Hank, look at the 20 years of shared commitment and effort that got us to this moment, and put it in the Louvre.

The entire stadium was in ecstasy, absolute breathless joy flooded through me. I've never felt anything so wondrously simple. Of all the unimportant things, football is the most important.

After the game, I celebrated with the Nerdfighters of Plough Lane, and then several players made their way out of the locker room to be with the fans, and I met up with the world's greatest left-back, Jack Currie, and then later, Wimbledon's manager, and coaching staff, showed up at the pub to take selfies and sing with the fans.

I don't need you to love football, I only need you to love something that brings you together with others whose love is pointing in the same direction. For me, that's football, but for you, it could be crochet, or Jane Austen, or distance running, but to be bound up with friends and strangers alike is the human condition, and to be in community is to be, for me, anyway, more fully alive.

Of course, the game could've gone the other way - but every once and again, we are reminded that hope is truly the thing with feathers, and we fall in love with the broken world all over again.

Hank, I'll see you on Friday.

(crowd singing Can't Help Falling In Love by Elvis Presley)