For Usher, Putting the Toilet Seat Down Is a Sign You Really Like Someone

With his buttery voice and killer moves, his boyish “who, me?” grin, his incomparable style—and, yes, his abs—Usher has been giving a clinic on smoothness for almost three decades. He’s won Grammys (8), notched top-ten hits (18!), and is now the face of the new Ralph’s Club New York fragrance from Ralph Lauren. Because you can’t be as smooth as Usher without a deep understanding of the importance of smelling great.

Below, he shares the life lessons he learned from his mom—and Oprah, his favorite meal to cook, and how to tell when you really like someone.

Not counting the new fragrance, complete this phrase: I love the smell of _____ .

Life.

You’re living a pretty sweet-smelling life. What scents bring you back to childhood?

I always think of my childhood when I smell ivy. I love the smell of ivy, and the South has a lot of it. Or the smell of honeysuckle in the summer. Walking through a field of peaches and smelling the essence in the air, and what it felt like to be there. If I’m by the sea, the scent of the breeze. The sweetness of the summer—bubble gum, things like that.

Lingering for a moment in your childhood: What’s the best lesson your mother ever taught you?

You only have one time to leave a lasting impression. There’s the idea of you attempting to be what you think everybody else wants you to be, but the best you you can be is you. It’s the importance of integrity. My grandmother, too, teaching me that no matter how long you live, what you do with the time you’re given determines how long your impression stays when you’re gone. These are things that only a Black woman from the South would be able to prepare me for.

In your career, you’ve met and worked with some incredible women. What’s a lesson you’ve taken away from a woman who had an influence on you?

Oprah Winfrey and the fact that she’s always used her light to shine light on others.

And let’s not leave out the most important woman in your life, your wife, Jennifer. What has she taught you?

She’s taught me that sometimes we share more than we need to, and not everybody deserves your whole truth right away. Everyone isn’t smart as you think they are, and everybody isn’t as dumb as you may think they are. So be patient, listen more than you talk. And when you find a wife, you find a companion, you find a queen.

How do you know when a new relationship is getting into wife territory?

When you start to understand the importance of leaving the seat down, it’s a grand sign of love and acceptance. It means you’re beginning to transform. You go to the restroom and you start to think, Wait a minute, let me leave the seat down. Now, hmm, why did I start thinking that way? I must like her! Plus, you don’t want the other side of it, when she complains about falling in in the middle of the night.

What’s the best way to tell a woman you’re sorry if, hypothetically, you mess up?

The best way to tell a woman you are sorry is to say it. But the best way for it to have a lasting impression is for her to believe it through your actions.

Your wife is hungry. What can you whip up?

I’m a breakfast-all-day type guy. I’m Mr. Brinner: breakfast for dinner. I can make fresh pancakes. I make this amazing Tuscan egg toast that I created: I cut out the center of a nice piece of bread—you cut some substantial slices; don’t make it super thin. And I bake an egg in the middle of it.

When you have a nice brinner going at home, what female singer is on the turntable?

That’s easy. Anita Baker. Anita Baker all day. The next one, if you want super cool? Sade. You can’t go wrong with Sade, man.

Let’s say you have a free Saturday night. Limo to the club? Or a movie on the couch with microwave popcorn?

You know what I tell my wife? We ain’t gotta go nowhere tonight, because I am the party. Everything you want, you can have right here. You want bottle service, I got you. You want loud music, I got you. You wanna Netflix and chill? I got you. You wanna invite over people and we have game night, I got you. You wanna sit over in the corner and let’s read a book, chapter for chapter? Because we do that. We take a book and just read to each other and we share in the knowledge. And if we want to burn a hookah, we burn a hookah. You want me to sing to you? I got you. We can make it all work at home. Everybody can. Not everybody has a pool, but everybody can make a hookah and dance and read a book.