We see this adherence to the rough lives of the peasants in Boy with a Sickle, in which it seems strange that van Gogh would use the word “boy” in his titling of the painting, Boy with a Sickle (1881). In this, one of his earliest pieces, the male figure seems to be losing hair, his face too worried, and his hands too large and defined to be a “boy.” 
Van Gogh places him in a crouched position, bending over the sparse grass before him. But in the way in which van Gogh drew him, the boy appears to be floating, and not really putting his weight onto his bottom leg, which is what should naturally happen. He appears almost twisted, and it seems as though there is an invisible giant weight on his upper back, shown by the way his back is hunched, and his elongated neck dips. His bent over pose allows the viewer to see how the work in nature that this boy is doing is taking his childhood away from him rapidly, and pressing him down further, as shown by the awkward and anatomically inaccurate length and dip of his back. After learning how van Gogh felt about his connection with nature, and that with the peasants, the viewer of this drawing can fully understand what exactly van Gogh meant, and can begin to see a connection between the strange bent over positioning and van Gogh’s intentions.
That year, he also drew Man at a Fireplace in which he takes not a boy, but just the opposite: an elderly man, working even in his old age, to build a fire. Van Gogh used charcoal in this sketch to show the man’s rough features and thereby convey his need for rest. His face looks almost pained to be leaning over the fire in an attempt to warm himself and his modest home. 
The man is not bent as far over the fire as he could be, and certainly not as much as the boy, who was crouched over the ground. But since he is elderly, his body might not allow him to do so. This could be a result of all of the hard and backbreaking work that he has done in his past; he, like the boy in the previous drawing, appears to be aging rapidly as a result of the condition of his life. Or is this less hunched over position part of van Gogh’s message? Ives would probably think that the old man was positioned in a way that was easiest for van Gogh to illustrate, but could he, rather, be depicting a slow progression upward, and thus a slow rise throughout a working day as they get closer to the work being finished and their return to their families?