When I pay for something, I like to see the product in my hand.

That’s why I’m a little disappointed that North Carolina on Thursday ended its license tag sticker program.

I got my last sticker and registration card on Monday.

It was always a source of pride for me to know I was doing my civic duty, adding to Halifax County’s coffers, helping the school young’uns out, and avoiding getting stopped for not displaying that drab sticker. I’m already missing those days of the more colorful ones where you had to apply the month on the left and the year on the right. What fun those days were!

Walking out of the license plate agency or the post office — depending on when I renewed my plates — I always felt like some stirring patriotic song should be playing in the background as I immediately put the new sticker on. I felt my head swelling so much I often thought I should have some building in Halifax County named after me.

With coverage of alleged racist comments on Facebook, pleas to have either the mayor or city manager, or both, step down, data centers, and armories, September was a blur. I knew there was no time for the online process, unless NCDMV magically started same-day drone deliveries for people who are feeling the sting of social media critics or just didn’t have time last month to get it done.

I knew I was going to have to do it the old-fashioned way: inspection, tax office, license plate agency.

The reason I included the tax office in my stops was that I wanted to see if I was being hoodwinked by the state or county. It seems several folks were paying higher than average and going to the tax office to protest in Halifax Resolves fashion — or, in reality, most likely politely asking if there had been a mistake.

A lot of folks got adjustments. I didn’t.

That’s because I’m no longer driving a high-mileage car. Sadly, I had to trade in my once-trusty 2010 Toyota Corolla, which I drove for some 15 years.

I didn’t mind the red paint peeling on the hood. I didn’t mind the more than 200,000 miles I had accumulated. It was the frequency of spark plug coil malfunctions over the last couple of years that forced me to suck it up and take on a new car payment.

For those of you who have had those problems, you know what I’m talking about. There’s that violent shaking that made the tremors we felt from the 2011 Virginia earthquake feel like one of those old Magic Fingers beds you used to find in motels. To even get the car up to 35 mph you had to floor it, only to have to repeat the process when a red light caught you.

There’s the condensed version of why I’m no longer identifiable when I’m driving around. There’s no St. Louis Blues sticker on my rear windshield, no faded and peeling Friends of the Roanoke Canal Trail decal, and no sticker remembering my dear friend, dedicated part-time ad salesman, and devoted Roanoke Rapids firefighter Kevin Hawkins.

So, yeah, no luck on a tax discount because I’ve got 37,000-some miles on my 2023 Honda Accord.

On Monday, a longstanding rite of passage came to an end: no more peeling old stickers from my plate, no more hearing God Bless America or America the Beautiful in my mind as I go through my new sticker ritual, and I doubt they’ll be naming the post office or some other building after me.

Next year, there’ll just be a hollow feeling that I was scammed and have nothing to show for plopping down nearly $250 for something I can’t hold, and no rousing Sousa march in my head while doing my civic duty — Lance Martin