WHAT HAPPENED on May 10, 2010 was supposed to change all this. The Filipino people trooped to the polls in strong numbers and voted for Benigno Aquino III and seemingly put the excesses of the Arroyo administration behind them.

There was an almost palpable halo surrounding Mr. Aquino and his people in the months immediately following the elections. Everything seemed to shine bright, to be brand spanking new and something completely different. Mr. Aquino took what appeared to be a completely different approach to governance, taking chances by cleaning house and trying to undo the last, twisted actions of the previous regime.

And the Filipino people looked on, smiling, expectant. You could sense it: They wanted something different. So they beamed upon the evolving Cabinet, kept an open mind about the Hacienda Luisita confusion, even warmed to the idea of somehow pulling the reins on the last round of pork barrel allocations. Public opinion remained strongly supportive of the new President and all his men.

Even the weather seemed to be playing along. It?s already September and your regularly scheduled typhoons have been pulling punches or deciding to go in a different direction. The sun seemed to shine a little bit brighter.

Then, life caught up with us. A bus careens off a cliff, killing more than 40 people. A video of policemen apparently torturing a naked, helpless suspect emerges, triggering outrage and handwringing. An irate motorist shoots a bus driver on a hot Metro Manila night. A disgruntled policeman turns a sight-seeing trip into a bloodbath and an international incident. Dengue?s shadow sinks its claws into Quezon City, hungry for more. Honeymoons end. The storm gathers. And we are stunned.

We thought things would change. But nothing has, strictly speaking. It?s one thing to believe in a leader and protect your right to vote that leader into office. It?s a whole other thing to expect your chosen messiah to become a literal savior, someone who can change things with a wave of his hand, with a crinkle on his brow.

It is easy to jump to the conclusion that the expectations were too high for P-Noy. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that the expectations were wrong. We all expected it would be easy, that P-Noy would take care of it.

This attitude is more widespread than we realize. We watch the news in a bemused and also hopeful fashion now. It cannot be denied that we want?demand?an entirely new way of doing things from this administration. We seem to be trying to will the Aquino administration into fixing all that has gone wrong in the last two administrations. It?s not enough.

Despite the surprising amount of action being taken by the Aquino government to transform into what it imagines to be the government the Filipino people need and want, we have to be patient. Change cannot be done overnight, no matter how much we want it. It is comforting to know that we seem to have taken a position of alertness, of paying attention, regarding what government is doing now. It is good to know that lessons were learned from the train wreck that was the Arroyo regime. So far, so good, we say to ourselves, and then pat ourselves on the shoulder for doing the right thing.

As the first 100 days of the new administration approaches, we have to acknowledge that a lot of things have gone remarkably well. The Aquino administration has also been lucky. But this can?t go on indefinitely, and soon we will have to make the decision: Do we put pressure on the Aquino administration because it doesn?t seem to be doing enough, or do we stand up and call for more patience?

It?s not surprising that we expect great things from Mr. Aquino and company. That, after all, was what they promised. And it is correct. Things will go wrong, accidents will be made?and they can?t be helped. But that is no reason to curb what we want from someone we placed in the highest post in the land. We expect Mr. Aquino to not only meet our expectations, we demand that he exceed them. That was what we voted for when we walked in the morning light to cast our vote last May. We did not vote for mediocrity. We did not vote for the usual.

Our successful selection of Mr. Aquino was a success of our imagination: that we can conceive of a government that does not treat us like marks and enablers. Instead of accepting familiar futility almost from the very start, we deserve a government that understands that, a government that believes it can meet those expectations?and then make them real.