And as a precious public holiday, it's a break from school or work for most Americans.

We tend only to hear about the Americans who make those decisions loudly (like the armed anti-lockdown protesters), or making the decisions poorly (like the 62 wedding-goers in Maine who spread at least 178 cases).

The Centers for Disease Control has bluntly asked Americans not to travel for Thanksgiving, while the nation's top disease expert, Anthony Fauci, asked Americans to keep their gatherings as small as possible.

Joe Biden delivered remarks on the eve of the holiday to urge Americans to follow the experts' advice.

A survey commissioned by the New York Times found that only about 27 per cent of Americans said they planned to spend Thanksgiving with someone outside their household.

More than 3 million Americans packed into airports this week for Thanksgiving travel.

Another 47.8 million were expected to drive to gatherings according to a mid-October survey from the American automotive association, but that number could have dropped as warnings increased.

Telling your parents or grandparents or aunts or uncles that you won't come home this year is like telling them that you're not ready for them to be gone forever.

For some Americans — even ones that believe fully in the science and threat of the virus — the allure of a normal holiday during a stressful year will be too strong a magnet to avoid.

But for what the surveys and articles suggest is the majority of Americans, Thanksgiving will be an extension of what they've been asked to do for the last nine months: compromise.

None of this will guarantee that Americans won't see empty chairs at the next Thanksgiving dinner.