Brown: Hunting licenses in Minnesota will soon go digital. I get it. And I hate it.

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My wallet barely folds. I can assure you that it’s not because of cash. Most of my financial transactions are digital. I stash my life savings in a vault of tiny electronic ones and zeros.

Instead, this wallet stores sentiment. Fundraising discount cards that I forget to use. Insurance cards for a son who has moved away. Little scraps of memories I’ve tucked away for years.

But the most sentimental objects in my wallet — the reason it won’t fold — are my hunting and fishing licenses. These legal documents don’t just allow me to harvest our great state’s natural bounty, they grant rare access to living relatives and long dead ancestors.

Let me be clear. I am a sorry excuse for a hunter and angler. I’d be content to walk the woods with an empty gun or sit by the lake with a small container of gummy worms. No, I keep the licenses up to date because, once in a while, I am inspired to cast a line or load the rifle. If I do, and I swear I might, I’d hate to run afoul of the law. Besides, license fees support conservation and habitat. Let’s call it a contribution.

There’s a ritual to buying your licenses. A lot of stores sell them, including several bigger retail outfits. But I always buy mine at the Balsam Store, a little gas station and hardware store out in the woods of Itasca County. It’s near my house and I can see if they’re busy just by driving by. No sense in causing a fuss during morning rush.

They always want to know the zone where I’ll be hunting. This is not an abstract question. They’re referring to numbers on a map that look like legislative districts for a government of trees. I explain that I’m not hunting locally, that my family hunts up near Greaney. Then I have to run my finger along the map, following dirt roads and winding rivers to the number I forget every year.

The machine whirs and out comes a glossy scroll. I tuck the indestructible document into a little plastic sleeve. Certain that I will lose or forget the licenses, I tuck the whole works it into my wallet, which will not close properly until Thanksgiving.

It’s a small ritual, but one that I’ve come to enjoy. And this year might be the last time I ever do it.

Starting in 2025, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources will implement an electronic license system. This new system will cover hunting and fishing licenses along with boat, snowmobile and recreational vehicle registrations. An app will not only allow you to share your license with conservation officers on your phone, but also report your harvest without affixing a tag to the animal. If you’re away from cell service, the app records the information and sends it when you gain a signal.

It’s a tremendous convenience, to be sure, and clears up the murky waters surrounding using a cellphone picture of your license instead of the real thing. If you don’t want to buy your license from your home computer or phone, you can still go to your local retail outlet to sign up. But let’s be honest, the demand for this service will likely change after the new system is in place. The state will still issue paper licenses to those who prefer to carry them, but they will be of the printer paper variety.

And yet, this isn’t the first time hunting has changed. One hundred years ago, hunting licenses were once written out on small paper cards by your local game warden. He got to pocket the fees and fines because the state didn’t pay him a salary. Naturally, this system created an ethical quagmire for hunter and officer alike.

One thousand years ago, hunters worked in teams using hand weapons. They didn’t even have doughnuts waiting for them in the shack. Ten thousand years ago, a hunter might pursue large game on foot for days, waiting for it to drop from exhaustion. Today’s hunter could totally do that if they felt like it. They just don’t feel like it.

Hunting and fishing are still an important part of people’s lives, but we run the risk of losing all tactile feeling as they, too, go digital. No, the licenses aren’t what binds us together. It’s just one less reason to gather in public. And, in this lonely world, we need more reasons to connect with each other, now more than ever.