(ARA) - Remember that guy or girl from high school, the good looking one with the great sense of humor? Remember how you always hoped you would get together, but somehow your "in-between-boyfriends/girlfriends" cycles just never fell in sync? Well, you may still have a chance with a first love, years after graduation day.

Reconnecting with high school friends, romantic partners and even "might-have-been" boyfriends/girlfriends through online reunion Web sites is becoming an increasingly popular - and successful - dating option. The young and restless may be willing to continue looking for love in all the wrong places, but a growing group of mature, transitioning daters are looking to their past to find the foundation of a happy future.

"We receive thousands of e-mails from people who tell us they've rekindled an old flame or found new love with an old high school friend," says Ted Cahall, chief operating officer of Classmates Online Inc., which operates the popular Classmates.com Web site which has 40 million members. "Reconnecting with someone you knew in school is special because your shared experiences are timeless, so it's never too late for a second chance at friendship, romance or even love."

From online dating services and Web sites to resurging interest in blind dates and professional matchmakers, it seems most single, busy Americans are willing to try just about anything to find their soul mates. Options abound.

You can have someone you know arrange an old-fashioned blind date, or make your own through an online dating service. "Intellidating" entails trying to meet people with similar interests by going to singles events at places you like to go, such as the museum or opera. Speed dating - rotating through a series of potential partners for a few minutes each during lunch hour - may appeal to the chronically busy. One major cable service now even offers "dating on demand," that allows subscribers to view video profiles of singles from across the country.

For the former Mary Johnson, who re-entered the dating scene following a divorce, blind dates and Internet dating provided less than satisfactory results. Johnson, still living in the same Ohio town where she graduated from high school, decided to turn to Classmates.com to reconnect with some old girlfriends. "Most of my friends were all married," she says. "I was really trying to find some girlfriends who were in the same boat as me, and who would be interested in going out together."

Within weeks of posting her profile on Classmates.com, Mary received an e-mail from Jim Bevins. In high school, Bevins was acquainted with the boyfriend of Mary's best friend. The quartet went out together a handful of times during the last half of Mary's junior year - Jim's senior year. Although there was some mutual attraction, Jim had a girlfriend at the time and there never seemed to be an opportunity for the attraction to develop into something more.

Receiving Jim's e-mail was "unexpected but exciting," Mary says. "I remembered the attraction I'd felt for him in high school and thought to myself this could be something." For three months, the pair e-mailed, instant messaged and talked on the phone. By October 2003, they knew they had to meet in person.

"We had no opportunity to really date since Jim was living more than 2,000 miles away in California," Mary says. When Jim made the trip back to Ohio to see "if the old chemistry was still there," Mary picked him up at the airport. "From the moment we laid eyes on each other, it was all over. We knew we couldn't live without each other."

Bevins sold his house in California and moved back to Ohio. In August 2004, the couple merged their families - both have two children, ages 10 and 7, from their previous marriages - and began making wedding plans. On June 18, 2005, they married in the garden of their home, with Jim's son serving as ring-bearer and daughter as flower girl, and Mary's two sons giving her away.

Society is becoming more accepting of Internet dating and other non-traditional means of meeting a partner, Mary suggests. "If I was 20 and had single girlfriends, I might have done the bar scene," she says. "But reconnecting through Classmates.com provided more of a comfort level. And there is the excitement of reconnecting with someone from your past."

It's never too late to explore the possibility of rekindling an old flame, or finding new love with an old acquaintance. It's easy to visit www.classmates.com and rediscover friends from kindergarten, grade school, high school, college, work and the military.

Courtesy of ARA Content