At about 11 p.m. on Nov. 4, 2008, millions of Americans had that butterflies-in-the-stomach feeling when it was announced that Barack Obama would become the 44th president of the United States. He courted us for two years and Americans said yes. And this past Tuesday, the world joined in celebration as our relationship with Obama was consummated.

But much like the beginning of any other relationship, America’s love affair with Obama began with astronomic expectations that not even Superman could meet if he took the presidency.

Obama has promised to help us make peace with our past, especially the baggage we left in the Middle East. According to USA Today, Obama intends to “bring the Joint Chiefs of Staff in” and “give them a new mission: to end this war responsibly and deliberately but decisively.”

Obama has also promised to ease our money problems, which has been proven time and again that are never good for a relationship. According to Reuters, he hopes to “protect or create 3 to 4 million jobs” in his first four years in office. Within his first 100 days in office, he has vowed to “get Congress to pass his stimulus plan of $825 billion.”

Finally, Obama has promised to help us clean up our act. According to USA Today, his energy plan includes yearly weatherization of “one million homes, $7,000 tax credits for fuel-efficent cars and putting one million hybrid cars on the road by 2015.”

Former President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who took office in 1933, is a good example of getting in and taking care of things. He had a burst of activity in his first 100 days as president to enlarge the federal government and pull the United States out of the Great Depression. Some analysts believe that Obama faces a time of financial crisis on par with Roosevelt’s.

Americans will almost certainly stalk the new president’s every move in his first 100 days in hopes of seeing sweeping changes from our last “relationship,” which left many financially, emotionally and perhaps politically scarred.

Despite America’s projected surplus when George W. Bush was elected in 2000 and the electoral “mandate” by which he was re-elected in 2004, Bush now leaves office with a mere 24 percent approval rating, according to PollingReport.com.

Although the wind is at his back, it is important to understand that Obama may not live up the expectations we have set for him. In spite of the similarities in their situation, it is worth noting that FDR’s famous “First 100 Days” did not completely heal America’s wounds.

But for as much as his predecessor President Hoover is blamed for the Great Depression, the fact is that it took America’s involvement in World War II to completely pull us from the ditch.

However, we are not interested in throwing water on the fire that is Obama’s parade. Even if he does not follow through on his promises, his election as the first African-American president of this country a mere 143 years after the passage of the Thirteenth Amendment outlawing slavery is worth one last reflective thought on how far we have come.

That said, before Obama has the chance to mess things up with the American public, let’s simply take a moment to remember that we as Americans are here to see such a monumental moment of history. For now, that should be enough.

Before television pundits, hockey moms and editorial writers have a chance to tear down Obama, let us pause and savor this last, simple moment; when the old flame finally burned out, when fist-bumping replaced cigarettes as the post-coitus celebration and President Barack Hussein Obama II was merely “Barry” in our eyes.