One tough lady Virginia Goeden had a close call earlier this month, before having a pacemaker implanted to stabilize her heart and blood pressure. She and her family credit her hair dresser for saving her life. (Staples World photo by Tom Crawford) Virginia Goeden may not be a spring chicken, but she has more lives than most cats.

Virginia is an 82-year-old gal who doesn’t let any dust gather under her feet.She has cheated death at least four times, the last three of those in the recent months. Most recently, she has her hairdresser in Staples to thank for checking on her when she failed to show up for a regular hair appointment.

Heather Rollins knew that Friday morning, Feb. 12, that something was not quite right. Virginia just doesn’t miss her weekly 7:30 a.m. appointment without calling. So she called Virginia’s number, and got no answer.

“I know she’s going to be on time, so I try to get there by 7:15 or before so I’m ready for her,” Heather said.

Virginia has been a Foster Grandparent for the past 16 years, working with kindergarten children in Connie Roline’s classroom at Staples Elementary.

Caring concern Heather Rollins, flanked by five-year-old Keith and three-year-old Amy, credits her small town concern for a customer and friend as the reason she drove to Virginal Goeden “There was no school that morning, so I thought maybe she changed her appointment.” Heather said. But when Julie Peterson came in about ten to eight, she said Virginia had confirmed her normal time just the day before. That news made Heather even more worried.

“I thought maybe she slipped on ice or something. I was concerned so I called a second time.” Again, no answer at Virginia’s tidy little home on the south side of Staples, on Roosevelt Street. So Heather left the Family Hair Care salon and drove to Virginia’s home.

“Fortunately I had a block of time free,” the part-time stylist said. Heather knocked on the door but there was no answer. The door was locked and she could hear Virginia’s radio on inside. She grew even more concerned. Fortunately, it’s a small world and her husband Mike and Virginia’s son, Tim Goeden, were high school buddies and have worked together on construction jobs since then. She called home, asked Mike for Tim Goeden’s cell phone number and called Tim. Tim, at the time near his home in Baxter, told Heather where a key is kept that unlocks his mother’s door.

“I got in, with Tim still on the cell. I walked in and where I could see in the kitchen, I could see she was there on the floor. I told Tim she was down and I was hanging up to call 911.”

Virginia was breathing, but unresponsive, Heather said. She got her covered with a blanket and held her until the EMT’s arrived. “I managed to hold it together until the ambulance arrived. But I could not answer their medical questions.”

Virginia was taken to Lakewood Health System, where she was stabilized, and then transferred to St. Cloud. There doctors soon inserted a temporary pacemaker to stimulate her heart. On Saturday, they took out the temporary and implanted a permanent Medtronic device, the size of a pocket watch, near her breastbone.

Doctors told her part of her heart was not working properly, causing her heart rate and blood pressure to fluctuate. “My blood pressure before was a roller coaster. The last week or so I was not feeling so good.”

Virginia remembers that Friday morning feeling a little dizzy. “It felt like the flu, but there was no pain. I kept walking back and forth. I sat down in my chair and then I laid down on the floor.”

“The phone rang and I could not get up to answer it. I just had no energy. It’s a good thing I go every Friday morning to the beauty shop before I go to school.” “She (Heather) came over here “She (Heather) and found me. I wonder how long I would have lain there if she hadn’t.” Heather noted Virginia and her other clients are important to her. “I didn’t have grandparents. We adopt these people, they are so much more than clients. We give each other hugs, even before this.

“I just knew something wasn’t right. I could have just called and left it at that, but it just wasn’t right. It’s part of living in a small town,” she said.”Virginia’s sharp as a tack, she’s not one to forget an appointment.”

In the past two months, it turns out, Virginia has had two other fainting episodes like this. Her friend Fran Mertens remembers Virginia passing out at a church service. She rode the ambulance out to the hospital that time as well, with medics keeping tab of her vital signs.

About two week’s later, Virginia was at one of her weekly senior dances. A lady who never misses a chance to dance, she got light headed and then drove herself to the hospital.

Back in 1929, in rural South Dakota, Virginia had her first close brush with death. She was just nine months old when her father, mother and two older sisters died when their car collided with a railroad box car backing across a road in Scotland, S.D., Virginia might have been killed as well, but she says her mother threw her from the car seconds before the train hit, saving her life.

Virginia was raised by her grandparents and wound up in Staples many years ago. She’s worked previously at the Care Center pharmacy and Brenny Funeral Home.